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2 SEP 12 1960 

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THE EXPOSITOR’S 


ΠΕ, bahar AMENT 


EDITED BY THE REV. 
W. ROBERTSON NICOLL, M.A., LL.D. 


BDITOR OP “THE EXPOSITOR,” “THE EXPOSITOR'S BIBLE,” ETC. 


VOLUME V. 


HODDER AND STOUGHTON LIMITED 
LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO 


SAN iid Seah irate 
er aT) (47 ᾿ PALS SUNN 
ee, Tease ᾿ 


08 ἐν νυν ΨΨΑΦῚ ΔΝ 


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ἀν τοῦ 


RO. oo gL hg 1 ἢ 
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ἘΠῚ: 
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Pie, EXPOSITOR’'S 
ΓΙ Κ TRS PAMEN T 


I 


THE FIRST EPISTLE GENERAL OF 
PETER 


BY THE REV. 


J. H. A HART, M.A. 
II 


THE SECOND EPISTLE GENERAL OF 
PETER 


R. H. STRACHAN, M.A. 
ΠῚ 
THE EPISTLES OF JOHN 


DAVID SMITH, M.A., D.D. 
IV 
THE GENERAL EPISTLE OF JUDE 


BY THE REV. 
J. B. MAYOR, Lirt.D. 
Vv 


THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN 
THE DIVINE 


BY THE REV. 


JAMES MOFFATT, D.D. 


HODDER AND STOUGHTON LIMITED 
LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO 








THE FIRST EPISTLE GENERAL 





OF j Fi ἡ 
ἊΝ 









i πὴ 

ἤν "ΠῚ ἢ ἮΝ 

ihe My Ay? f aly 
i hy : τὴ he ei ie ἢ sare ¢ 
| ra pie bi ain Υ 





INTRODUCTION 


In the case of this document a question preliminary to the ordinary 
heads of Introduction arises; the question of the Unity of the 
Epistle. For it contains two formal and solemn conclusions. 
The first! is ‘ That in all things God may be glorified through Fesus 
Christ to Whom belongs the glory and the victory to the ages of the 
ages. Amen,” and the second,? ‘‘ Now the God of all grace, he who 
called you to his eternal glory in Christ, himself shall refit you after 
brief suffering, shall confirm you, shall strengthen you, shall establish 
you. His is the victory to the ages of the ages. Amen.” ‘The latter 
conclusion is followed by a postscript which ends with yet another 
formula of conclusion * “ Peace to you all who are in Christ”’. 

The address‘ at the head of the document stamps it as a circular 
letter or an encyclical epistle. The three conclusions divide it into 
three parts. Of these the last and shortest part may fairly be taken 
as a true postscript. The writer (we may suppose) takes the pen 
from the secretary, to whom he has been dictating, and appends a 
greeting in his own handwriting. St. Paul did the same thing in 
the Epistle to the Galatians.° In such a case the value of the post- 
script would be greater than in the case of a circular letter addressed 
to widely separated churches in different provinces or countries. 
The Galatian letter would naturally be preserved in the chest of the 
chief church of the province; and St. Paul’s autograph would be 
prized as proof of the authenticity of the exemplar, copies of which 
were doubtless made and supplied as need and demand arose. But 
in this case also the autograph has a value of its own, inasmuch as 
it gives the credentials of the bearer, who presumably went from 
place to place and read it out to the assembled Christians, letting 
them see the postscript before he travelled on. So the third part of 
the letter may well be an integral portion of this encyclical. 

But this postscript is preceded not by one conclusion but by two; 
and in this the document bears witness against its own unity. And 


Dive, ΤΊ, ΧΟ, ὅν, 14. Ἔτσ, > Gal. vi. 11-17. 


4 INTRODUCTION 


further it is to be noted that the first conclusion is followed by a 
general form of address—“ Beloved ”—which has occurred at an 
earlier point.1 In fact, apart from the formal superscription—X to 
Y greeting—the second part? of the Epistle is a complete epistle in 
itself. And it is natural enough that a circular letter, addressed to 
different communities, should contain alternative or additional letters, 
if the writer was aware that the conditions or circumstances were 
not identical in every case. The formal severance of the second 
part may, therefore, be taken as indicating that all the communities 
addressed were not necessarily in the condition, which that part 
implies. 

1. The Recipients.~-Eusebius of Czsarea, whose Ecclesiastical 
History belongs to the beginning of the fourth century, is the earliest 
(extant) writer, who inquired systematically into the origins of the 
Christian literature. For him there is no question about the nation- 
ality of the first recipients of this document: they are Hebrews or 
Jewish Christians. He insists that the compact made between St. 
Peter and St. Paul at Jerusalem® was faithfully observed, as their 
respective writings and the evidence of St. Luke agree to testify: 
“That Paul, on the one hand, preached to those of Gentile origin and 
so laid the foundations of the churches from Jerusalem and round 
about as far as Illyricum is plain from his own statements and from 
the narratives, which Luke gives in the Acts. And, onthe other hand, 
from the phrases of Peter it is clear in what provinces he for his part 
preached the Gospel of Christ to those of the Circumcision and 
delivered to them the message of the New Covenant—I mean, from 
his acknowledged epistle in which he writes to those of Hebrew origin 
in the dispersion of Pontus and Galatia, Cappadocia and As and 
Bithynia.* 

Just before this® plain statement Eusebius quotes verbally from 
Origen’s exegetical commentary upon Genesis: “ Peter seems to have 
preached in Pontus and Galatia and Bithynia, in Cappadocia and 
Asia to the Fews in dispersion”. Origen’s assertion rests presumably 
on the authority of the address of our document, although the order 
of the provinces differs in respect of Bithynia from the generally 
accepted text. When Eusebius speaks for himself he restores the 
conventional order of the provinces and explicitly quotes the authority 
of ‘‘the acknowledged Epistle”. It does not seem at all probable 
that either Eusebius or Origen had any other evidence for their belief 
than such as is preserved for modern investigation. Both knew of 


yk ἜΤ Viv, 12-v. II. 3 Gal. ii. 7-9. 
4Eus. ἢ. E. iii. 4. 5 Eus. WH. Eo ai. τ᾿ 


INTRODUCTION 5 


the compact, in virtue of which Peter was to continue his work among 
the Jews: both construed the direction of the Epistle as proof that 
the writer had preached the Gospel to his readers: therefore in 
virtue of the compact his readers were fews—Jews of the Dispersion, 
but still Jews. 

The evidence upon which both Eusebius and Origen seem to rely 
is extant; the deduction drawn—characteristic as it is of patristic 
exegesis—is not necessarily valid, and it is not supported by any 
pretence of independent tradition. 

The compact to which James and Cephas and John, on the one 
side, and Paul and Barnabas, on the other, were consenting parties, 
cannot be held to prove these Christians to be Jewish Christians— 
even if it could be made out that St. Peter “the Apostle of the Cir 
cumcision,” who writes to them, converted them to Christianity. 

The appellation of the Dispersion is on the face of it a weightier 
argument, because Dispersion is a technical term and comprises in 
itself all the Jews who lived outside Palestine. Whatever its pro- 
venance, the term is Jewish through and through, for it insists upon 
the First Cause of all such scattering and upon the central shrine 
from which the exiles are removed. The mere Greek spoke and 
thought of exiles as fugitives and had a collective term φυγή to cor- 
respond with the Jewish διασπορά. But the Jewish word recognises 
that those dispersed are placed here and there—as exiles, traders 
and what not ?—by God. Jewish as it is, this appellation is capable 
of extension to the new Israel and does not necessarily imply that 
the persons addressed were born Jews. Ultimately and fundamentally 
it does not denote privilege like the term Jsvael but rather penalty— 
removal from the place which was traditionally associated with the 
visible presence of Jehovah. The writer may, perhaps, be taken to 
use it without a precise definition of a centre corresponding to the Holy 
Land of the Jew; but there is no valid ground for doubting that he 
could apply it to Gentiles, who were in the world and not of it by 
virtue of their faith in Christ. Situated as they were among un- 
friendly friends these Gentile churches are collectively the new Dis- 
persion. 

These Gentile Churches—for there is more than one passage in 
our document which seems to settle the point, apart from general 
probabilities to be derived from the traditions of St. Paul’s missionary 
activity. Inthe first place, St. Peter! applies to his readers the words 
of Hosea?; ye who were once no People but now are God’s People, 
who were not ina state of experiencing His mercy, but now have 


1ii. To, 2 See Hosea ii. 23. 
VOL. V. I 


6 INTRODUCTION 


come under its influence.”’ At a definite time God had shown mercy 
to these Christians, who before—according to the strict Jewish point 
of view—had been outside the pale of His mercy. And, if we may 
argue from silence as from the tenses employed, they were formerly 
not a people at all, to say nothing of their being no people of God. In 
fact they were just tribes and Gentiles—not a dads but just ἔθνη. It 
is true that Hosea was speaking of the children of Israel, who had 
apostatized, and of the final restoration, when all the dispersed should 
be gathered together. It is true, again, that St. Paul! uses the pro- 
phecy conformably with the apparent intention of the prophet; but 
he cites it more fully than St. Peter in connexion with the calling of 
the Gentiles.2 The Christian Church is God’s, Israel the heir of His 
promises; and—who knows ?—the writer may have added the title 
of the Dispersion partly because it is written in the book of Hosea, 
‘©and I will sow her unto myself upon the earth, and I will love her 
who was not beloved, and I will say to Not-my-people, Thou art my 
people and he shall say, Thou art the Lord my God”. It is a great 
prophecy and a Jewish Christian would be slow to forget its first 
intention. Noline of argument can exclude the possibility that some 
of the Christians, to whom his letter is addressed, were born Jews. 
And if he thought less of them and most of the aliens, who, perhaps, 
outnumbered them, at anyrate his own mind was Jewish and he 
spoke to his Jewish self, before he wrote or dictated his letter. It 
must have been a strange experience for a Jew to preach a Messiah, 
whom his Nation had rejected, to a motley collection of Gentile be- 
lievers and to use such prophecies as this. 

But whatever emotions the words stirred up within his heart 
they remained there. The thought of his countrymen does not 
shake him visibly as it shook St. Paul ;* and from this self-repression 
one might conclude that the Jewish element in these churches was 
insignificant, or that the decree which severed him and them from 
the unbelieving Jews was already made absolute. 

The probable significance of this use of Hosea’s phrase is sup- 
ported by the words, “ For ye were once wanderers like sheep but now 
ye have returned to the shepherd and overseer of your souls”’.’ It is, 
of course, possible to exaggerate the force of ἐπεστράφητε, ye have 
returned, as if it implied a previous association with God. But the 
word means no more than obedience to the invitation Repent, 
which Christian missionaries addressed to all the world; in the 
Septuagint it is used of Jewish apostasy without implying previous 

1Rom. xi. 28-32 2Rom. ix. 24-26. 3 Hosea ii. 23 (LXX). 
Rom. ix. 1 ff. Sii. 25. 


INTRODUCTION 7 


apostasy, and here it is fitly applied to the adherence of Gentiles, 
who previously had no faith in God. In fact its proper force is 
represented by turn rather than return. 

Another capital passage would seem to be sufficient in itself to 
show that the writer regarded the churches to whom he speaks, as 
composed of Gentile Christians : “ Sufficient is the time that is past 
for the accomplishment of the ideal of the Gentiles, when you walked 
in. . . unlawful idolatry”... If they were Jews by birth, who are so 
reproached for their pre-Christian life, it is clear that they must have 
been renegades, who had forfeited their title to be reckoned as Jews, 
For so great an apostasy there is no evidence whatever. That in- 
dividuals in the Dispersion did succumb to the attractions of the life 
outside the ghetto is probable enough. Philo, for example, warns 
his fellow countrymen against the seductions of pagan mysteries ; 
and his own nephew gave up his faith in order to become a soldier 
of fortune. But the interpretation, which makes Jews of the 
readers, involves an impossible assumption of wholesale perversion. 
The persons in question are, surely, Gentiles; before their conver- 
sion they lived as their neighbours lived, and, after their conversion, 
they excited the surprise of their neighbours by their change of life.? 

The internal evidence of the Epistle is borne out by what is 
known of the evangelisation of the provinces named. With the ex- 
ception of Cilicia all Asia Minor is included and Asia Minor was the 
great field of the labours of St. Paul and his companions, There is 
nothing to suggest that St. Peter was addressing converts of his own 
as Origen and Eusebius*® seem to assume. 

The Author.—The beginning and the final conclusion of this 
document certify it to be the letter or epistle of Peter the Apostle of 
Jesus Christ, who speaks of Silvanus and Mark as his companions 
and writes from ““ Babylon”. The certificate was accepted and re- 
mained unquestioned until quite modern times. Irenzeus, whose 
connexion with Polycarp is certain, quotes the document as 
written by the Peter of the Church—Simon, son of John, to whom 
Jesus gave the name of Cephas or (in Greek) Peter. When PF. C. 
Baur (for example) speaks of the “alleged apostolic authorship of 
writings which bear the marks of pseudonymity so plainly on their 
face,” * he illustrates the reaction which ran riot, when once the 
doctrine of the inspiration and authority of canonical books was 
called in question. The authorship of this document does not 

liv. 3. Piva 4. 3 See above page 4. 

4 Church History (English translation: London, 1878), p. 131 (note) in refer- 
ence to the Epistle of James and the First Epistle of Peter. 


ὃ INTRODUCTION 


necessarily decide the question of its authority—all or none—as it 
did in the time of uncritical devotion to the letter of Scripture. But 
Baur’s brave words do no more to solve the problem than the stolid 
reiteration of traditional dogmas. And it is to be remembered that 
Catholic traditions have often been rehabilitated by critical researches. 

To the question, “ Do you at this time of day venture to attribute 
this document to Simon Peter?” the answer is, ‘‘ Why not ?”’ 

Such a conservative attitude excites the pity—if not the contempt 
—of the “advanced” critics, They find no difficulty in treating the 
Canonical Epistles as most men have treated the Epistles of Phalaris 
—ever since Bentley wrote his dissertation. Bentley said! out of 
Galen, “ That in the age of the Ptolemies the trade of coining false 
Authors was in greatest Practice and Perfection... . When the 
Attali and the Ptolemies were in Emulation about their Libraries, 
the knavery of forging Books and Titles began. For there were 
those that to enhance the price of their Books put the Names of great 
Authors before them, and so sold them to those Princes.” But Bentley 
proceeded to demonstrate that the Epistles of Phalaris contained 
blunders incompatible with their authenticity; and—for all their 
exquisite reasons—the critics, who treat the First Epistle of Peter 
as falsely so-called, have not yet found their Bentley. Indeed, their 
reasons are chiefly interesting as symptoms of presuppositions in- 
herited from past controversies. They reveal (for example) a ten- 
dency to resent the attribution of divine authority to the Apostles, 
and a tendency—which others share—to ignore the relatively mature 
theology to which, as a matter of fact, the first Christian mission- 
aries were bred, before ever they became missionaries or Christians 
at all. For those who believe that the Church has been directed by 
the Holy Spirit it is not easy to suppose that others than James and 
Peter, Jude andsJohn were as destitute as they were full of divine 
inspiration. Andi it is not difficult to acquiesce in the excommunica- 
tion of Marcion and all others who regard Christianity as a new 
thing descended from heaven with no affinity to any earthly ante- 
cedents. 

In a natural and simple phrase this document professes to be 
written by Peter. But Harnack? has put forward the hypothesis 
that the opening and closing sentences® are an interpolation by an- 
other hand and argues against the assumption that the whole is a 
forgery. “If,” he says, ‘‘ the hypothesis here brought forward should 
prove erroneous, I should more readily prevail upon myself to regard 
the improbable as possible and to claim the Epistle for Peter him- 


1 Wagner’s edition (London, 1883), pp. 80, 81. 
2 Chronologie, p. 457 ff. 3i, I, 2 and v. 12-14. 


INTRODUCTION 9 


self than to suppose that a Pseudo-Petrus wrote our fragment as it 
now stands from the first verse to the last, soon after a.p. 90, or 
even from ten to thirty years earlier. Such an assumption is, in my 
opinion, weighed down by insuperable difficulties.1 

So far as extant evidence goes Harnack’s hypothesis of interpola- 
tion has nothing on which to rest. It remains to consider the chief 
objections which have been urged to prove that the traditional view 
is improbable. Peter cannot have written the Epistle (it is said) 
because (1) it is clearly indebted to Paulinism, (2) it contains no 
vivid reminiscences of the life and doctrine of Jesus, (3) it is written 
in better Greek than a Galilean peasant could compass, and (4) it 
reflects conditions which Peter did not live to see. 

The first reason is regarded as decisive by Harnack:? ‘‘ Were it 
not for the dependence [of 1 Peter] on the Pauline Epistles, | might 
perhaps allow myself to maintain its genuineness: that dependence 
however, is not accidental, but is of the essence of the Epistle’. Dr. 
Chase has examined the affinities between 1 Peter and the Epistles 
of the N.T., and it is sufficient to state the results at which he arrives. 
‘The coincidences with St. James can hardly be accounted for on the 
ground of personal intercourse between the two writers. . . . The 
coincidences with the Pauline Epistles other than Romans and 
Ephesians are not very close and are to be accounted for as the out- 
come of a common evolution of Christian phrases and conceptions 
rather than as instances of direct borrowing. . . . There is no doubt 
that the author of 1 Peter was acquainted with the Epistle to the 
Romans. Nor is this surprising if the writer is St. Peter. . . . The 
connexion of Ephesians with 1 Peter (here he adopts the words of 
Hort) is shown more by the identities of thought and similarity in 
‘the structure of the two Epistles as wholes than by identities of 
phrase... .” In his summing-up he says: “ All that we learn of St. 
Peter from the New Testament gives us the picture of a man prompt 
and enthusiastic in action rather than fertile in ideas. His borrow- 
ing from St. James’ Epistle shows that his mind was receptive and 
retentive of the thoughts of others. The Epistle undoubtedly owes 
much to St. Paul. But it is only when the Pauline element is isolated 
and exaggerated that it becomes a serious argument against the 
Petrine authorship of the Epistle.” ὃ 

It is to be remembered, also, that St. Paul did not invent Paul- 
inism and that St. Peter manifests (according to the narrative of 


1 Die Chronologie, 464 f. (quoted by Chase, Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible, 
vol. ili. p. 786 Ὁ). 

2 Chron. p. 364 (quoted by Chase). 

3 Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible, vol. iii. pp. 788 f. 


IO INTRODUCTION 


Acts) a disinclination to associate with the Gentile which suggests 
that he also was a strict Pharisee. There can be no doubt that of 
the Apostles of Christianity, who are known to us, St. Paul’s was the 
master-mind. And there can be no doubt that St. Paul brought to 
the service of the Church a body of doctrine which he had inherited 
from Gamaliel and the masters of*Gamaliel. The common notion 
that Christianity was something absolutely new planted by St. 
Paul and watered—watered down—by St. Peter and finally by St. 
John is inconsistent with known facts and with general probability. 
It is, indeed, the vicious product of the artificial isolation of the New 
Testament literature from the literature and the life of Judaism. 

Others than St. Paul modified their inherited theology in the 
light of their belief, that Jesus, having been raised from the dead, 
was the promised and anointed deliverer—the Messiah, who by 
revealing God’s will more fully than the prophets or the scribes, but 
not independently of either, introduced to men more fully the Sove- 
reignty of Heaven, under whose yoke he lived and died. Inevitably 
and insensibly the first Christian teachers learned from each other 
and profited by their own and each other’s experience. But they all 
inherited and already possessed the presuppositions and categories of 
the Scribes, whose teaching their Master had endorsed and extended. 
Into this body of theology they fitted the new fact of a crucified Mes- 
siah—into the framework of Pharisaism—as Pharisees fitted all new 
facts which threw fresh light upon the will of God. If St. Paul was the 
first (as our fragmentary evidence suggests) to find a deep significance 
in it, it is not derogatory to St. Peter to suggest that he may have 
been indebted to St. Paul both here and elsewhere, and such in- 
debtedness is not necessarily an argument against the authenticity 
of this Epistle of Peter. 

The second objection is that our document contains no vivid re- 
miniscences of the life and doctrine of Jesus such as we should 
expect from a persona! disciple. 

The alleged expectation is not altogether a reasonable one. If 
the document is, as an unbroken chain of tradition affirms, a pastoral 
letter addressed to Christian Churches already in being, there is no 
reason to expect reminiscences of the life and teaching of Jesus. The 
Church was built upon the belief that Jesus was raised from the dead 
and so declared to be the promised deliverer. His submission to 
death—and the death of the cross—was the crown and the summary 
of His life as it was the fulfilment of His teaching. So far as other 
facts and traditions were relatively necessary to the faith of the 
converts they were naturally communicated—formally or informally— 
by those who founded or confirmed the Churches. But in an epistle 


INTRODUCTION II 


like this they would have been irrelevant and inconclusive. The oc- 
casion called for the emphatic isolation of the glorious resurrection, 
which followed the culmination of the sufferings of Jesus and in which 
His past miracles were swallowed up like stars in the sunshine. As 
for the teaching of Jesus our records are plainly incomplete, and, 
whether the Fourth Gospel be permitted to give evidence or not 
it is quite clear that the arguments used by Jesus and the topics He 
treated were determined for Him by the character of those to whom 
He addressed Himself. When the Christian missionaries addressed 
themselves to men of different nationalities, they could not presume 
in them knowledge of Jewish presuppositions and therefore, quite apart 
from its relative insignificance they postponed indefinitely much of 
the teaching of Jesus. For in any case this teaching was relatively 
insignificant in their view; the essence of their message was Jesus 
and the Resurrection. Particular incidents and particular sayings 
may have their value as links in the chain of proof that—witness here 
and witness there—Jesus was He of whom Moses and the Prophets 
had spoken. But such proof belongs properly to the controversy 
with the Jews and, in many cases, not to the original phase of it. 
Historical or biographical sermons upon which the Gospel according 
to St. Mark is by tradition asserted to be based, were a sequel to the 
summons, ‘‘ Repent and believe”. It may well be that St. Peter 
did so preach, and that he dwelt rather upon the record of Jesus’ life 
in Galilee of the Gentiles, because his own audience had little in 
common with the Jews of Jerusalem; but his reminiscences of the 
ministry prior to the Passion were not, as has been said,! ‘‘ the best, the 
most inspiring message that he could deliver at such a critical time”. 
He himself had seen and heard these things; yet, when the crisis 
came, he himself denied and repudiated Jesus. The impressiveness 
of these things, which failed to convince an eye-witness, was not likely 
to be heightened, when he repeated them to strangers. And there 
can be little doubt that, if he had inserted a reference to the Trans- 
figuration (for example), it would be said nowadays that this was the 
mark of a sedulous forger, anxious to keep up the part he was playing. 
In his intercourse with Jesus St. Peter had learned and unlearned 
here a little and there a little. But at the last his faith was not 

1Von Soden, Early Christian Literature (English Translation), London, 1906, 
pp. 278 f. : ‘* It is evident that St. Peter cannot have written this epistle. The oldest 
personal disciple of our Lord would never have omitted the slightest reference to that 
which must above all things have distinguished him in the eyes of his readers. And 
how, especially at such a critical time, could he have refrained from speaking of 


reminiscences which formed the best, the most inspiring, message that he could 
deliver ?”’ 


12 INTRODUCTION 


proof against the appearance of failure. When, therefore, he con- 
verted and began to establish his brethren, he imparted to them the 
convictions he had acquired, and did not parade the diverse and 
devious steps by which he had painfully reached that height. 

A third objection is that the Greek of this Epistle is better than 
a Galilean peasant could compass and that a Palestinian Jew would 
not possess such a familiar knowledge of the Old Testament in 
Greek. 

Such an objection seems to take no account at all of certain 
known facts and of general probability. Even a Galilean peasant, 
who stayed in his native place, needed and presumably acquired 
some knowledge of the Greek language in his intercourse with the 
non-Jewish inhabitants ofthe land, whom Josephus calls indifferently 
Greeks and Syrians. If he went up to Jerusalem for the feasts 
he there came into contact with Jews of the Dispersion, most of 
whom lived in the Greek-speaking world. The part played by these 
assemblies in cementing the solidarity of the whole nation is 
commonly overlooked; and therefore it is worth while to quote 
Philo’s explicit statement on the subject.1 ‘‘ The Temple made with 
hands,” he says, ‘“‘ is necessary for men in general. They must have 
a place where they can give thanks for benefits and pray for pardon 
when they sin. So there is the temple at Jerusalem and no other. 
They must rise up from the ends of the earth and resort thither, if 
they would offer sacrifice. They must leave their fatherland, their 
friends and their kinsfolk, and so prove the sincerity of their religion. 
And this they do. At every feast myriads from East and West, 
from North and South repair to the Temple to be free for a little 
space from the business and the confusion of their lives. They 
draw breath for a little while, as they have leisure for holiness and 
the honouring of God. And so they make friends with strangers 
hitherto unknown to them ; and over sacrifices and libations they form 
a community of interests which is the surest pledge of unanimity.” 
In the face of this, it seems impossible to accept the modern dis- 
tinction between Alexandrian and Palestinian Judaism as corre- 
sponding to an absolute severance in life, language and religion in 
the first century of the present era. Apart from this normal inter- 
course of all classes of religiously minded Jews, those who aspired 
to direct their fellows as Sages or Scribes seem to have travelled in 
foreign countries as a part of their training. And further, it is 
known that the delivery of the Temple dues at Jerusalem was 
regarded as a pious duty which the foremost members of each 


1 De specialibus legibus, i. (de templo), §§ 67-70 (Cohn and Wendland, vol. v. pp, 
17f.; ii. p. 223, Mangey). 


INTRODUCTION 13 


community were selected to perform. In these and other ways the 
Jews of Palestine became acquainted with the Greek language and, 
so far as they engaged in religious discussion with their visitors or 
hosts of the Dispersion, with the Old Testament in Greek also. 
‘The translation known as the Septuagint was still a triumphant 
achievement, through which the Jews of the Greek world were 
retained within the fold of Judaism and the Greeks outside were 
offered knowledge of the Law. And even when the Christian 
missionaries began to utilise in the interests of their own creed the 
laxities of the Septuagint, the non-Christian Jews produced the 
‘Greek versions of Aquila Symmachus and Theodotion. In fact, so 
far as and as long as any sect of Judaism engaged in missionary 
enterprise knowledge of the Greek language and the Greek Bible 
was indispensable to its agents. 

It is therefore entirely in keeping with the tradition that this 
document is the Epistle General of St. Peter, the Apostle of the 
‘Circumcision, that it should be written in passable Greek and bear 
evident traces of familiarity with the Septuagint. In order to prove 
that Jesus was the deliverer for whom the prophets had looked, he 
was bound to appeal to the Scriptures, and to the Scriptures in that 
-version which was established as the Bible of the Greek Dispersion. 

If in spite of these and other considerations it is felt that the 
‘general style of the Epistle is too literary for one who had lived the 
life and done the work of St. Peter, there is still another line of 
defence for the traditional view. In other words, it is still possible 
to believe that the document as it stands gives a just and true 
-account of its own origin. In the postscript! the author says, “J 
write (or I have written) to you, briefly by means of Silvanus the 
faithful brother, as I reckon him”, 

If the phrase 1 write by means of Silvanus may be taken to imply 
that Silvanus was not only the bearer of the Epistle but also the 
trusted secretary who wrote out in his own way St. Peter’s message, 
then all the difficulties derived from the style of the document and 
its use of Pauline ideas vanish at once. And in any case this mention 
-of Silvanus proves that St. Peter was closely associated with the 
sometime colleague of St. Paul, who had actually helped to preach 
the Gospel in Syria, Cilicia and Galatia.2 For there seems to be no 
reason for questioning the identification of the Silas of the Acts with 
the Silvanus of the Pauline Epistles and this Epistle. 

The interpretation of the phrase διὰ Cidovavod is still in dispute. 
‘Professor Zahn? maintains the view that ‘‘Silvanus’ part in the 


ly. 12, 2See Acts xv. 23, 40 f.; xvi. 1-8. 
5 Introduction to the New Testament (English Translation, 1909), vol. ii. p. 150. 


14 INTRODUCTION 


composition was so important and so large that its performance 
required a considerable degree of trustworthiness. . . . It purports 
to be a letter of Peter’s; and such it is, except that Peter left its 
composition to Silvanus because he regarded him as better fitted 
than himself . . . to express in an intelligible and effective manner 
the thoughts and feelings which Peter entertained toward the Gentile 
Christians of Asia Minor” 

Dr. Chase! quotes Professor Zahn as arguing that Silvanus. 
‘“must have been either a messenger who conveyed the letter or a 
friend who put St. Peter’s thoughts into the form of a letter’’. 
Against this interpretation, he says, four “ considerations seem 
together decisive”; and he concludes that Silvanus carried the 
Epistle and did not write it. It is of course possible that the phrase 
may bear this meaning, but the other is not to be excluded. The 
parallels quoted are, with two exceptions, ambiguous, and of the 
exceptions each supports one of the rival views. In Acts xv. 22, 
for example, it is said that the Apostles chose Judas and Silas and. 
wrote by their hand.? Clearly they were the bearers of the letter, 
as it is said that they delivered it at Antioch ; 8 and “ being prophets. 
they exhorted and confirmed the brethren”.* But it is certainly 
possible if not definitely probable that they actually wrote each a 
copy of the letter for himself at the dictation of St. James. The 
case on which Dr. Chase chiefly relies is the postscript of Ignatius’ 
letter to the Romans: “1 write these things to you by the worthy 
Ephesians: Crocus whom I love is by my side with many others’”’.® 
But even here the other interpretation is not impossible. They 
certainly were the bearers, but for safety’s sake each may have written 
his own copy of the letter. The journey from Smyrna to Rome was. 
long and dangerous, and apart from considerations of safe delivery 
each of them may well have desired to have his own copy. And there 
is one clear case in which this ambiguity disappears: Dionysius, 
Bishop of Corinth, writes to Soter, Bishop of Rome, in acknowledg- 
ment of a letter received from the Roman Church, which (he says) 
“‘we shall always have to read for our admonition like the former: 


1 Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible (1900), vol. iii. p. 790. 

"γράψαντες διὰ χειρὸς ἀυτῶν. 

% Acts xv. 30, οἱ μὲν οὖν ἀπολυθέντες κατῆλθον εἰς ᾿Αντιόχειαν καὶ συν-- 
ἀγαγόντες τὸ πλῆθος ἐπέδωκαν τὴν ἐπιστολήν. 

4 Acts xv. 32. 

°Ad Romanos, xiv. 1, γράφω δὲ ὑμῖν ταῦτα ἀπὸ Ομύρνης δι᾽ Ἔφεσιων τῶν- 
ἀξιομακαρίστων. ἔστιν δὲ καὶ ἅμα ἐμοὶ σὺν ἄλλοις πολλοῖς καὶ Κρόκος τὸ ποθητόν- 
μοι ὄνομα. 


INTRODUCTION 15 


Epistle written to us through Clement”.! Here the preposition 
clearly denotes the interpreter who writes in the name of the Church 
and cannot cover the messenger also, because the bearers of the 
Epistle—Claudius Ephebus, Valerius Bito, and Fortunatus—are 
named at the end.’ 

Since, therefore, διά can in such contexts designate the writer as 
well as the bearer of an Epistle, it is hardly safe to say that Silvanus 
cannot have been both in this case. If St. Peter had not so far 
profited by his general experience and in particular by his association 
with Silvanus and other missionaries as to write moderately good 
Greek and to employ “Pauline” ideas, then we may suppose that 
he permitted Silvanus to write the Epistle for him. He was none 
the less the real author if he employed a letter-writer whose position 
and experience enabled him to supplement the author’s alleged 
deficiencies in respect of the language and modes of thought familiar 
to the persons addressed. The postscript indicates St. Peter’s 
approval of the draft thus made and submitted to him. The tone 
of authority which is used in the addresses to separate classes is 
naturally reproduced by the secretary from his recollection of what 
St. Peter had said. The secretary’s intervention affects only the 
manner of the Epistle at most. If Silvanus had really contributed 
to the matter he would have been joined with St. Peter in the 
salutation. On the other hand, there is every reason to suppose 
that Silvanus was also St. Peter’s messenger plenipotentiary and 
would, as when he was sent by the Apostles of Jerusalem, “ proclaim 
the same things by word of mouth ”’.8 

The fourth objection to the traditional view is that the Epistle 
reflects conditions which were definitely later than the date of St. 
Peter’s death. No other book of the New Testament offers any 
plain information about St. Peter at any time after the hypocrisy he 
practised at Antioch. But Christian tradition connects him not 
only with Antioch > and Asia Minor °—statements which are probably 
simple inferences from the statements of St. Paul’s Epistle to the 

1 Τὴν σήμερον οὖν κυριακὴν ἅγιαν ἡμέραν διηγάγομεν ἐν ἦ ἀνέγνωμεν ὑμῶν trv 
ἐπιστολήν" ἣν ἕξομεν aet ποτε ἀναγινώσκοντες νουθετεῖσθαι ὡς καὶ τὴν προτέραν 
ἡμεῖν διὰ Κλήμεντος γραφεῖσαν (Eusebius, Historiae Ecclesiae, iv. 23. 8). 

2Clement, ad Corinthios, Ixv. 3 Acts xv. 27. 4Gal. i. 

5So Origen (in Lucam Homilia, vi.): ‘‘ Eleganter in cuiusdam martyris epistola 
scriptum repperi, Ignatium dico, episcopum Antiochiae post Petrum secundum, qui in 
persecutione Romae pugnavit ad bestias, ‘principem saeculi huius latuit virginitas 
Mariae’.” 

®So Origen (fragment in Eusebius, Historiae Ecclesiae, iii. 1): Πέτρος δὲ ἐν 
Πόντῳ καὶ Γαλατίᾳ καὶ Βιθυνίᾳ Καππαδοκίᾳ te καὶ ᾿Ασίᾳ κεκηρυχέναι τοῖς ἐκ 
διασπορᾶς ᾿Ιουδαίοις ἔοικεν. 


16 INTRODUCTION 


Galatians and the First Epistle of St. Peter respectively—but also 
with Rome. For this part of the tradition there is no obvious hint 
in the New Testament which can be used to explain away its origin, 
unless it be supposed that the bare mention of Babylon in the First 
Epistle of St. Peter is sufficient of itself to have given birth to so 
complete a legend. It is not surprising that Babylon should have 
been interpreted as meaning Rome from the first ; but the tradition, 
that St. Peter died at Rome under Nero, has nothing on which to 
rest in the Epistles or elsewhere. 

Tertullian is the first to state this tradition explicitly. We read, 
in the Lives of the Caesars, “‘ Nero first laid bloody hands upon the 
rising faith at Rome. Then was Peter girded by another when he 
was bound to the cross.”! But apart from the definite date, the 
tradition is as old as Clement of Rome, who cites St. Peter and St. 
Paul as ‘‘noble examples of our own generation ”’ in his Epistle to 
the Corinthians: ‘‘ By reason of envy and jealousy the great and 
righteous Pillars were persecuted and struggled on till they died. 
Let us put before our eyes the good Apostles—Peter, who by reason 
of unrighteous envy endured not one or two but many labours and 
so became a martyr and departed to the place of glory which was 
his due”.2. A brief account of St. Paul’s sufferings, based largely 
on New Testament evidence, follows; and the conclusion that St. 
Peter suffered before St. Paul and both at Rome is commonly drawn. 
After this Clement goes on to say: “Τὸ these men of holy life was 
gathered a great multitude of elect persons who by reason of envy 
suffered many outrages and torments and so became a noble example 
among us’’.° This further illustration of the terrible effects of envy 
and jealousy—the theme to which all these references are incidental 
—is most naturally interpreted as describing the victims of the 
Neronian persecution of a.p. 64, of whom Tacitus* spealis as “a 
huge multitude”. If, then, Clement has put his illustrations in 

1Vitas Caesarum legimus: Orientem fidem Romae primus Nero cruentavit. 
Nunc Petrus ab altero cingitur, cum cruci adstringitur (Scorpiace, 15). The fact 
is so stated as to indicate the fulfilment of the word of Jesus reported in John xxi. 
18: 

Ξδιὰ ζῆλον καὶ φθόνον οἱ μέγιστοι καὶ δικαιότατοι στύλοι (cf. Gal. ii. 9) 
ἐδιώχθησαν καὶ ἕως θανάτον ἤθλησαν. λάβωμεν πρὸ ὀφθαλμῶν ἡμῶν τοὺς ἀγαθοὺς 
ἀποστόλους Πέτρον ὃς διὰ ζῆλον ἄδικον οὐχ ἕνα οὐδὲ δύο ἀλλὰ πλείονας ὑπήνεγκεν 
πόνους καὶ οὕτω μαρτυρήσας ἐπορεύθη εἰς τὸν ὀφειλόμενον τόπον τῆς δόξης 
(1 Clementis ad Corinthios, v. 2-4). 

δ τούτοις τοῖς ἀνδράσιν ὁσίως πολιτευσαμένοις συνηθροίσθη πολὺ πλῆθος 
ἐκλεκτῶν οἵτινες πολλὰς αἰκίας καὶ βασάνους διὰ ζῆλος παθόντες ὑπόδειγμα 


κάλλιστον ἐγένοντο ἐν ἡμῖν (1 Clementis ad Corinthios, vi. 1). 
4 Annals, xv. 44. 


INTRODUCTION 17 


chronological order, he agrees with Tertullian in asserting that St: 
Peter died as a martyr under Nero and, being a conspicuous pillar 
of the Church, before the mass of the Christians. To this assertion 
Origen, quoted by Eusebius,! adds the statement that “at the end 
Peter being at Rome was crucified head-downwards having himself 
requested that he might so suffer ”’. 

Eusebius in his account of the Neronian persecution endorses 
this tradition of St. Peter’s martyrdom and cites evidence to prove 
its truth: “So then at this time this man who was proclaimed one 
of the foremost fighters against God was led on to slaughter the 
Apostles. It is related that Paul was beheaded in Rome itself and 
that Peter was likewise crucified in his reign. And the history is 
confirmed by the inscription upon the tombs there which is still in 
existence. It is also confirmed by an ecclesiastic named Gaius, 
who lived at the time when Zephyrinus was Bishop of Rome, who 
writing to Proclus, the leader of the Phrygian heresy, says these very 
words about the places where the sacred tabernacles of the aforesaid 
Apostles are deposited, ‘ But I can shew the trophies of the Apostles. 
For if you will go to the Vatican or to the Ostian Way you will find 
the trophies of those who founded this Church. And that they both 
became martyrs at the same time Dionysius, Bishop of Corinth, 
writing to the Romans proves in this way. You also by such 
admonition have compounded the plant of Romans and Corinthians 
which came from Peter and Paul. For they both of them came 
to our Corinth and planted us, teaching like doctrine, and in like 
manner they taught together in Italy and became martyrs at the 
same time.” 3 

All the other extant evidence? agrees with this, and we may 
fairly conclude that from the end of the first century it has been the 
unchallenged belief of the Christian Church that St. Peter was put 
to death at Rome in a.p. 64. The question therefore arises, Is this 
tradition compatible with the traditional ascription of this document 
to St. Peter ? 


Date, CIRCUMSTANCES, AND PuRPOSE. 


If St. Peter was the author of this document and if St. Peter 
perished in the persecution under Nero, it follows that the document 


1 Historiae Ecclesiasticae, iii. 1: ὃς καὶ ἐπὶ τέλει ἐν Ρώμῃ γενόμενος ἀνεσκολο- 
πίσθη κατὰ κεφαλῆς οὕτως αὐτὸς ἀξιώσας παθεῖν. 

3 Historiae Ecclesiasticae, ii. 25. 

3See Dr. Chase’s article on Peter (Simon) in Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible 
vol. iii. 


18 INTRODUCTION 


must have been written before a.p. 64, The conclusion is challenged 
on the ground of the circumstances implied by the document and 
consequently one or other of the premises is invalidated. The cir- 
cumstances implied and indicated are suppposed to belong to a date 
definitely later than the time of Nero; and from this supposition it 
follows either that St. Peter did not write the Epistle or that he 
did not perish under Nero. In either case the Epistle is now com- 
monly assigned to the reign either of Domitian (a.p. 81-96) or of 
Trajan (a.D. 98-117). Professor Gunkel (for example) in a popular 
commentary recently published! ends his introduction with the 
words: ‘‘ The more precise dating of the Epistle must be determined 
in accordance with the persecutions above mentioned, with which, it 
must be confessed, we are not perfectly acquainted. Now the 
Neronian persecution affected only Rome and not the provinces, 
On the other hand more general persecutions seem to have taken 
place under Domitian. The time of Trajan, under whom a persecu- 
tion (A.D. 112) to which the letters of Pliny to the emperor testify, 
certainly took place in Asia Minor, is open to the objection that 
then the Christians were compelled to offer sacrifice—to which the 
Epistle has no reference. Our Epistle is therefore best assigned to 
the early period of Domitian’s reign. A still later dating (sc. than 
the reign of Trajan ?) is excluded by the lack of references to Gnosis 
and the Episcopate.”’ 

Professor Ramsay similarly suggests, on the basis of the contents of 
the Epistle : ‘‘ ThevFirst Epistle of Peter then must have been written 
soon after Vespasian’s resumption of the Neronian policy in a more 
precise and definite form. It implies relations between Church and 
State which are later than the Neronian period, but which have only 
just begun.” ? 

Professor Cone ὃ urges that the conditions implied by the Epistle 
fit the time of Trajan, and argues, as against Professor Ramsay, that 
‘since they also fit the later date, they furnish no ground for exclud- 
ing it in favour of the earlier”. His conclusion is: “The data 
supplied in the Epistle and in known and precisely determinable his- 
torical circumstances do not warrant us in placing its composition 
more definitely than in the last quarter of the first, or the first 
quarter of the second, century”. For this he relies partly on Pro- 
fessor Ramsay’s opinion that ‘‘the history of the spread of Chris- 


1Die Schriften des Neuen Testaments neu iibersetzt und fur die Gegenwart 
erkldvt. . . Gottingen, 1908. 
* The Church in the Roman Empire (sixth edition: London, 1893), p. 282. He 
assigns it, therefore, to c. A.D. 80 at the end of Vespasian’s reign. 
3 Encyclopedia Biblica III., “ Peter, the Epistles of’’. 


INTRODUCTION 19 


tianity imperatively demands for 1 Peter a later date than a.p. 64”; 
and from it he deduces the corollary: “The later date renders it 
very probable that Babylon is employed figuratively for Rome, ac- 
cording to Rev. xiv. 8, xvi. 19, xvii. 5, xviii. 2, 10, 21”. 

Professor Cone’s corollary deserves attention. He seems to 
assume that the Christians started afresh—de novo or ex nihilo—to 
evolve modes and idioms of thought for themselves. Such an as- 
sumption is demonstrably untenable. In the particular case of such 
cipher-language as this, it is certain that the Christians appropriated 
the inventions of the Jews, who in their own oppressions and their 
own persecutions had ἈΠ AD to veil their hopes from all but the 
initiated. Babylon was the great and typical oppressor, and her 
successors in the part naturally received her proper name. Rome 
was not the declared and inflexible enemy of the Jewish nation as a 
whole before the time of Caligula; but Rome stood behind Herod 
the Great, and Pompey had desecrated the Temple at Jerusalem. 
Philo might forgive and forget the outrages which Pompey and 
Herod had perpetrated in order to heighten the enormity of Caligula’s 
offences, but the Psalms of Solomon and the evidence of Josephus 
suffice to prove that for some Rome was already the enemy in the 
last century B.c. Formal proof that the Jews actually spoke of 
Rome by the name of Babylon before the destruction of Jerusalem 
in A.D. 70 is, indeed, wanting. But the identification of Rome with 
Babylon and the consequent transference of the paraphernalia of 
Babylon to Rome is part and parcel of the apocalyptic vocabulary 
and passed over into the language of the Rabbis. The author of the 
Epistle had no more need to explain his use of Babylon than had the 
Jewish poet who wrote in the name of the Sibyl and said in reference 
to Nero :— 


‘‘Poets shall mourn for thee, thrice-hapless Greece, 
What time the mighty king of mighty Rome, 
Coming from Italy, shall pierce thine Isthmus— 
A God-like mortal, born (they say) of Zeus 
By lady Hera, who with dulcet songs 
Shall slay his hapless mother and many more. 

A shameless prince and terrible! He shall fly 
From Babylon...” } 


And again he prophesied that after a time and times and half a 
time? 


1Oracula, Sibyllina, v. 137-143 (Geffcken: Leipzig, 1902). 
3 1014. 154: “ἐκ τετράτου éreos”’ ; compare Daniel vii. 25. 


20 INTRODUCTION 


“Prom heav’n into the sea a star shall fall 
That shall consume with fire the ocean wide, 
And Babylon herself, and Italy...” 


Nero’s achievements added matricide to the specification of Anti- 
christ ; but the book of Daniel and other apocalypses, which were 
directly or indirectly inspired by the experience of the Jews under 
Antiochus Epiphanes, had long ago established the code of language 
by which each particular persecutor was identified with the vanished 
type. Inthe time of Antiochus such disguise was a necessary pre- 
caution ; and it was so again in the time of Nero or Vespasian, of 
Domitian or Trajan. In fact, Professor Cone’s corollary has nothing. 
to do with his conclusion. Whenever any Christian community be- 
came exposed for whatever reason to attack by any representative of 
the State, the State became for them the enemy, and therefore 
Babylon. ! 

For Trajan’s attitude towards the Christians of Bithynia we have 
ample testimony—thanks to the lack of independence displayed by 
his legate, the younger Pliny. Ina.p. 112 Bithynia was in a bad 
state. There were many abuses which called for remedies, and the 
province was distracted by factions.2 The law which forbade the 
formation of clubs or associations for different purposes had fallen 
into abeyance, and Pliny began by re-enacting it in accordance with 
Trajan’s mandate. On this policy Trajan insisted so strongly that 
he refused to authorise a fire brigade in Nicomedia, in spite of Pliny’s. 
protestations that only 150 men would be enrolled, only carpenters, 
and for the sole purpose of dealing with such a conflagration as had 
recently devastated the citys From experience he held that all 
corporations, whatever name they bore, quickly became political 
associations.’ This rigid interpretation of the law made the ordi- 
nary meetings of the Christians at once illegal; and there were so 
many Christians in Bithynia that the temples were almost deserted 
and the customary sacrifices were omitted. When the edict was 


1 Or. Sib. v. 158-160. 

?Trajan to Pliny, xxxii. (xli.): ‘‘ Meminerimus idcirco te in istam provinciam 
missum, quoniam multa in ea emendanda apparuerint; xxxiv. (xliii.) meminerimus. 
provinciam istam . . . factionibus esse vexatam”’. 

3 Pliny to Trajan, xcvi. (xcvii.): ‘‘Edictum meum quo secundum mandata tua 
hetaerias esse vetueram”’. 

‘Pliny to Trajan, xxxiii. (xlii.): “Τὰ, domine, dispice an instituendum putes 
Collegium fabrorum dumtaxat hominum Cl. Ego attendam ne quis nisi faber reci- 
piatur neve iure concesso in aliud utatur; necerit difficile custodire tam paucos”’. 

5 Trajan to Pliny, xxxiv. (xliii.): ‘‘Quodcumque nomen ex quacumque causa 
dederimus eis qui in idem contracti fuerit. . . . hetaeriae que brevi fient ”. 


INTRODUCTION 21 


published, some Christians — apparently renegades, who abjured 
Christianity when challenged by Pliny—asserted that either they or 
the Christians generally gave up either the practice of meeting for a 
common meal or their religious meetings also. It is improbable that 
those who persisted in their wicked and immoderate superstition 
should have abandoned their weekly assemblies at which they recited 
a hymn to Christ as God, but it is unnatural to distinguish between 
these assemblies and the subsequent meetings for the common meal, 
and the statement of the renegades may reasonably be confined to 
their own obedience to the edict. \ 

Professor Ramsay, however, infers from Pliny’s language that 
the statement refers to the Christians as a whole: “They had, 
indeed, been in the habit of holding social meetings, and feasting in 
common; but this illegal practice they had abandoned as soon as the 
governor had issued an edict in accordance with the Emperor’s in- 
structions, forbidding the formation or existence of sodalitates”+ 
And he asserts that Pliny’s language implies a distinction between 
the illegal meetings of the evening and the legal meetings of the 
morning: “The regular morning meetings which Pliny speaks about 
and which, as we know, must have been weekly meetings, were not 
abandoned, and Pliny obviously accepts them as strictly legal. Amid 
the strict regulations about societies the Roman government ex- 
pressly allowed to all people the right of meeting for purely religious 
purposes. The morning meeting of the Christians was religious; 
but the evening meeting was social, including a common meal, and 
therefore constituted the Christian community a sodalitas. The 
Christians abandoned the illegal meeting, but continued the legal 
one. This fact is one of the utmost consequence. It shows that 
the Christian communities were quite alive to the necessity of acting 
according to the law, and of using the forms of the law to screen 
themselves as far as was consistent with their principles.” 2 

Against this view it must be urged, in the first place, that the 
common meal of the Christian community had a definitely religious 
character and could not be abandoned without a breach of their 
principles; and, in the second place, that Pliny’s language is by no 
means so explicit and clear as is suggested. The authors of the 
statement are a large number of persons accused of Christianity, 
either by an anonymous letter or by an informer: all of them 
convinced Pliny that they had never been Christians, or had 
ceased to be Christians, by offering sacrifice to idols and blas- 

1The Church in the Roman Empire, p. 206. 
2 [bid. pp. 219 f. 
ΘΕ. 2 


22 INTRODUCTION 


pheming Christ.'! As regards their past Christianity—if ever they 
had practised Christianity—they affirmed that this was the sum 
and substance of their crime, that they had been accustomed to 
assemble on a fixed day before sunrise and to repeat alternately 
a hymn to Christ as God, and to bind themselves by an oath—not 
to commit any crime, but—to abstain from theft, brigandage, adul- 
tery, breach of faith, and refusal of any deposit; which done they 
usually departed and assembled again to take food, which food was 
taken by all together, and involved no crime. And even this, they 
said, they had ceased to do after the edict.” 

Here, surely, Pliny is concerned only with renegades who proved 
to him that the Christian faith which they had abandoned had led 
them into no crimes of which he must take cognisance. Their oath 
was not proof of conspiracy and their meal was not a cannibal feast, 
To satisfy himself that their denial of the charges brought against 
them was well founded, Pliny examined two slaves, who were called 
deaconesses, under torture. Finding nothing in them but a foul im- 
moderate superstition, he submitted the case to the Emperor.® 

The fact is that the large number of persons involved and the 
doubt whether those who had repented of their Christianity had 
thereby deserved free pardon, gave Pliny food for reflexion. Christi- 
anity had been rampant in his province, but his experience of these 
apostates gave him good hope that it might be checked. Apostates 
would naturally be more zealous heathens, and therefore good 


1 Pliny to Trajan, xcvi. (xcvii.): ‘‘ Propositus est libellus sine auctore multorum 
nomina continens. Qui negabant esse se Christianos aut fuisse cum praeeunte me 
deos appellarent et imagini tuae, quam propter hoc iusseram cum simulacris nomi- 
num adferri, ture ac vino supplicarent, praeterea male dicerent Christo, quorum nihil 
posse cogi dicuntur qui sunt se vera Christiani, dimittendos esse putavi. Alii ab 
indice nominati esse se Christianos dixerunt et mox negaverunt; fuisse quidem, sed 
desisse, quidam ante plures annos non nemo etiam ante viginti quoque. Omnes et 
imaginem tuam deorumque simulacra venerati sunt et Christo maledixerunt.” 

2 Pliny to Trajan, xcvi. (xcvii.) : “ Adfirmabant autem hanc fuisse summam vel 
culpae suae vel erroris quod essent soliti stato die ante lucem convenire carmenque 
Christo quasi deo dicere secum invicem, seque sacramento non in scelus aliquod 
obstringere, sed ne furta, ne latrocinia ne adulteria committerent, ne fidem fallerent, 
ne depositum appellati abnegarent; quibus peractis morem sibi discedendi fuisse, 
Tursusque ad capiendum cibum, promiscuum tamen et innoxium; quod ipsum 
facere desisse post edictum meum, quo secundum mandata tua hetaerias esse 
vetueram”’. 

8 Pliny, ibid.: ‘Quo magis necessarium credidi ex duabus ancillis quae minis- 
trae dicebantur, quid esset veri et per tormenta quaerere. Nihil aliud inveni quam 
superstitionem pravam immodicam. Ideo dilata cognitione ad consulendum te 
decucurri”’. 


INTRODUCTION 23 


citizens, in future. To execute them all would have been to diminish 
seriously the population of his province.! As a conscientious gover- 
nor, he was anxious to bring this section of his subjects to their 
senses, and he believed that the extension of clemency to those who 
repented of their Christianity would be the means most likely to 
secure that end.? If room for repentance was given, all the 
Christians might be induced to recant. He does not contemplate 
a policy of religious toleration at all. Though there might be no 
crimes inherent in the profession of Christianity, Christians were 
still guilty of sacrilegium when they refused to worship the gods of 
the Empire, even if they satisfied Pliny that their meetings were 
purely religious in character and, therefore, did not constitute them 
a sodalitas within the meaning of the law. Obstinate Christians 
had three opportunities of recantation: if they did not take ad- 
vantage of their opportunities, they were executed summarily—or, if 
they were Roman citizens, they were transported to Rome. It was 
an accepted and a familiar fact that a Christian was, as such, a 
criminal *—so familiar, indeed, that Pliny leaves their crime of sac- 
rilege to be inferred from the sacrifice required of those who would 
prove their apostasy. He confesses that he never occupied such an 
official position as to be called on to decide or advise in the case of 
Christians, and was therefore ignorant of the precise nature of the 
proceedings.* But he did not hesitate to condemn the obdurate,5 
although he might doubt whether the name itself, if it involved no 
crime, or the crimes attaching to the name were thereby punished.® 


1Ibid.: ‘‘ Visa est enim mihi res digna consultatione maxime propter pericli- 
tantium munerum. Multi enim omnis aetatis, omnis ordinis utriusque sexus etiam, 
vocantur in periculum et vocabuntur. Neque civitates tantum sed vicos etiam atque 
agros superstitionis istius contagio pervagata est; quae videtur sisti et corrigi posse. 
Certe satis constat prope iam desolata templa coepisse celebrari et sacra sollemnia 
diuintermissa repeti pastumque venire victinarum cuius adhuc rarissimus emptor.” 

2 Ibid.: ‘* Ex quo facile est opinari quae turba hominum emendari possit si sit 
paenitentiae locus’’. 

°Tbid.: ** Interrogari ipsos an essent Christiani. Confitentes iterum ac 
tertio interrogari, supplicium miratus: perseverantes duci iussi. Neque enim dubi- 
tatum, qualecumque esset quod faterentur, pertinaciam certe et inflexibilem obstina- 
tionem debere puniri. Fuerunt alii similis amentiae quos, quia cives Romani erant, 
adnotari in urbem remittendos,” 

‘Professor Ramsay’s paraphrase of Pliny’s words (#bid.): ‘‘ Cognitionibus de 
Christianis interfui numquam; ideo nescio quid et quatenus aut puniri soleat aut 
quaeri”’. 5 See note (1) supra. 

ὁ Ibid. : ‘‘ Nec mediocriter haesitavi sitne aliquod discrimen aetatum an quam- 
libet teneri nihil a robustioribus differant, detur paenitentiae venia an ei qui omnino 
Christianus fuit desisse non prosit. nomen ipsum, si flagitiis careat, an flagitia 
cohaerentia nomini puniantur ”. 


24 INTRODUCTION 


Such doubts as this arose from his examination of the renegades 
and the slaves who were called deaconesses, in which he learned 
that there were no crimes other than sacrilegium involved in the 
name, and, therefore, was emboldened to suggest that renegades 
should be pardoned. 

Trajan’s answer authorises the policy suggested: “Any one 
who denies that he is a Christian and gives plain proof of his. 
truthfulness, that is, by worshipping our gods, though his past may 
not be above suspicion, shall obtain pardon by his repentance’’.1_ No 
anonymous accusations are to be entertained,? and Christians are 
not to be sought out. If they are brought before the governor and 
convicted of being Christians they must, of course, be punished. 
Pliny did well to investigate the cases of the so-called Christians, 
who had been brought before him.* No general policy can be 
laid down. Trajan is content to endorse the existing practice of 
punishing obdurate Christians as Christians, and to sanction the 
pardon of such Christians as were prepared to renounce their 
Christianity and to ratify their renunciation by performance of 
heathen rites. 

Trajan’s endorsement of the action which Pliny took without 
hesitation against the Christians as such, proves that “persecution 
for the name” was already an established and familiar part of 
Roman policy. If Pliny had been present at trials of Christians 
before becoming governor of Bithynia, he might have learned that 
the vulgar were wrong in ascribing foul crimes to the Christians, as. 
such. But there is no question that Christians, as such, were liable 
to capital punishment. In the first instance, when he had only to 
do with those Christians who refused to apostatize, Pliny con- 
demned them to death almost instinctively as a matter of routine 
and immemorial tradition. 

Under Domitian (according to Dio Cassius) Flavius Clemens 
was put to death on the charge of atheism, and many others who 
embraced the customs of the Jews were condemned to death or 


1Trajan to Pliny, xcvii. (xcviii.). . . . puniendi sunt ita tamen ut qui negaverit 
se Christianum esse idque re ipsa manifestum fecerit, id est supplicando dis nostris, 
quamvis suspectus in praeteritum, veniam ex paenitentia impetret”’. 

2Tbid.: ‘‘Sine auctore vero propositi libelli in nullo crimine locum habere 
debent. Nam et pessimi exempli nec nostri saeculi est.” 

3Ibid.: ‘“* Actum quem debuisti, mi Secunde, in excutiendis causis eorum qui 
Christiani ad te delati fuerunt secutus es. Neque enim in universum aliquid quod. 
quasi certam forman habeat constitui potest. Conquirendi non sunt: si deferantur 
et arguantur, puniendi sunt”... . 


INTRODUCTION 25 


deprived of their goods. His wife Domitilla, a relative of the Emperor, 
was merely banished to Pandateria.! 

Suetonius? describes Flavius Clemens as a man of contemptible 
inactivity—a conventional description of Christians *—and says that 
he was put to death on the barest suspicion. Eusebius‘ asserts 
explicitly that Domitilla was banished with many others, because she 
bore witness to Christ. Probably the Christians were regarded as 
a Jewish sect who could not claim the privileges of Jews proper. 
Evidently the sect was proscribed. A Christian as such was liable 
to death, banishment, or confiscation of his goods. Domitian (as 
Eusebius® says) was the second persecutor of the Christian Church 
and made himself the heir of Nero’s battle with God. But according 
to Hegesippus,® as reported by Eusebius,’ Domitian stopped the 
persecution after examining the grandsons of Judas, the brother of 
Jesus.§ 


1|xvii. 14 (epitome of Xiphilinus): Kav τῷ αὐτῷ ἔτει (A.D. 95) ἄλλους τε πολλοὺς 
καὶ τὸν Φλάβιον Κλήμεντα ὑπατεύοντα, καίπερ ἀνεψιὸν ὄντα, καὶ γυναῖκα καὶ αὐτὴν 
συγγενῆ ἑαυτοῦ Φλαουίαν Δομιτίλλαν ἔχοντα, κατέσφαξεν 6 Aopetiavds: ἐπηνέχθη 
δὲ ἀμφοῖν ἔγκλημα ἀθεότητος, ὑφ᾽ ἧς καὶ ἄλλοι εἰς τὰ τῶν Ιουδαίων ἔθη ἐξοκέλλοντες 
πολλοὶ κατεδικάσθησαν, καὶ οἱ μὲν ἀπέθανον, οἱ δὲ τῶν γοῦν οὐσιῶν ἐστερήθησαν" ἡἣ 
δὲ Δομιτίλλα ὑπερωρίσϑθη μόνον εἰς Πανδατερίαν. 

2 Domitian xv. Denique Flavium Clementem patruelum suum contemptissimae 
inertiae ... repente ex tenuissima suspicione tantum non ipso eius consulatu 
interemit: quo maxime facto maturavit 5101 exilium. 

ὃ Compare Tertullian’s Apology, xlii.: ‘‘Sed alio quoque iniuriarum titulo 
postulamur et infructuosi in negotiis dicimur. . . . Quomodo infructuosi videmur 
negotiis vestris, cum quibus et de quibus vivimus, non scio. Sed si carimonias tuas 
non frequento, attamen et illa die homo sum.” 

4 Historiae ecclesiasticae, iii. 18: “ εἰς τοσοῦτον δὲ apa . . . ἡ τῆς ἡμετέρας 
πίστεως διέλαμπε διδασκαλία, ὡς καὶ τοὺς ἄποθεν τοῦ Kal’ ἡμᾶς λόγου συγγραφεῖς 
μὴ ἀποκνῆσαι ταῖς αὐτῶν ἹΙστορίαις τόν τε διωγμὸν καὶ τὰ ἐν αὐτῷ μαρτύρια παρα- 
δοῦναι. οἵγε καὶ τὸν καιρὸν ἐπ᾽ ἀκριβὲς ἐπεσημήναντο, ἐν ἔτει πεντεκαιδεκάτῳ 
Δομετιανοῦ μετὰ πλείστων ἑτέρων καὶ Φλαυίαν Δομετίλλαν ἱστορήσαντες, ἐξ ἀδελφῆς 
γεγονυῖαν Φλαυίου Κλήμεντος, ἑνὸς τῶν τηνικάδε ἐπὶ Ῥώμης ὑπάτων, τῆς εἰς 
Χριστὸν μαρτυρίας ἕνεκεν, εἰς νῆσον Ποντίαν κατὰ τιμωρίαν δεδόσθαι." 

5 Historiae ecclesiasticae, iii. 17: ““ Τῆς Νέρωνος θεοεχθρίας τε καὶ θεομαχίας 
διάδοχον ἑαυτὸν κατεστήσατο. δεύτερος δῆτα τὸν καθ᾽ ἡμῶν ἀνεκίνει διωγμὸν, καίπερ 
τοῦ πατρὸς αὐτοῦ Οὐεσπασιανοῦ μηδὲν καθ᾽ ἡμῶν ἄτοπον ἐπινοήσαντος.᾽ 

Hegesippus was an Eastern—probably a native of Palestine. He visited Rome 
in the episcopate of Anicetus (? a.D. 155-156) and published his five books of 
Memoranda or Memoirs (ὑπομνήματα) in Α.Ὁ. 180. See Bardenhewer, Geschichte 
der altkirchlichen Literatur, i. pp. 483-490. 

Historiae ecclesiasticae, iii. 20: “ἐφ᾽ οἷς μηδὲν αὐτῶν κατεγνωκότα τὸν 
Δομετιανὸν, ἀλλὰ καὶ ὡς ἐντελῶν καταφρονήσαντα, ἐλευθέρους μὲν αὐτοὺς ἀνεῖναι, 
καταπᾶυσαι δὲ διὰ προστάγματος τὸν κατὰ τῆς ἐκκλησίας διωγμόν 


26 INTRODUCTION 


Eusebius’ quotes Tertullian? to the same general effect: 
“ Domitian, a semi-Nero in cruelty, attempted to condemn the 
Christians ; but, being also a man, he readily stopped the course of 
action he had begun, and even recalled those whom he had 
banished ”. 

But Nero was the first to persecute the Christians * and something 
is known of his procedure from Tacitus,‘ who represents his per- 
secution as a final effort to divert from himself the suspicion of 
having given orders for the fire of Rome. Human assistance, public 
largesses, services of expiation, all failed to banish the calumny. So 
to put an end to the rumour, Nero made the Christians, as they were 
commonly called by the vulgar who hated them for their crimes, 
scape-goats in his place and visited them with the most elaborate 
penalties. Christ from whom their name was derived was executed 
by the procurator Pontius Pilate in the reign of Tiberius. For a 
time this fatal superstition was suppressed, but it broke out after- 
wards not only in Judaea, the birthplace of the mischief, but also in 
Rome ... Accordingly, in the first instance those who confessed 
were arrested ; and afterwards on their information a huge multitude 
were sent to join them not so much on the charge of arson as on that 
of hatred of the human race. 

Tacitus emphasises the fact that the Christians were guilty and 
deserved to suffer the last penalty of the law. Public feeling con- 
demned them as enemies of civilised society; but the outrageous 
mockery with which Nero had them executed, and the common sus- 
picion that the alieged arson was a mere pretence produced a revul- 


1 Historiae ecclesiasticae, iii. 20. 

2 Apology v.: “ Temptaverat et Domitianus, portio Neronis de crudelitate; sed qua 
et homo (ἀλλ᾽ οἶμαι ἅτε ἔχων τι συνέσεως, Eusebius) facile coeptum repressit, restitutis 
etiam quos relegaverat. 

8 Tertullian, Apology, v.: ‘‘Consulite commentarios vestros; illic reperietis 
primum Neronem in hanc sectam cum maxime Romae orientem Caesariano gladio 
ferocisse. Sed tali dedicatore damnationis nostrae etiam gloriamur. Qui enim scit 
illum, intelligere potest non nisi grande aliquod bonum a Nerone damnatum.” 

4 Annals, xv. 44: ‘‘Sed non ope humana, non largitionibus principis aut deum 
placamentis decedebat infamia, quin iussum incendium crederetur. Ergo abolendo 
rumori Nero subdidit reos, et quaesitissimis poenis affecit, quos per flagitia invisos vul- 
gus Chrestianos (sic) appellabat. Auctor nominis eius Christus, Tiberio imperitante, 
per procuratorem Pontium Pilatum supplicio affectus erat. Repressaque in praesens 
exitiabilis superstitio rursus erumpebat, non modo per Judaeam originem eius mali 
sed per urbem etiam. . . . Igitur primo correpti qui fatebantur, deinde indicio eorum 
multitudo ingens, haud perinde in crimine incendii quam odio humani generis 
coniuncti sunt.” / 

5 Ibid.; ‘ sontes et novissima exempla meritos”’. 


INTRODUCTION 27 


sion in their favour... The bare punishments—crucifixion, burning | 
at the stake, and death by wild beasts—were right and proper, But 

the people to whom Nero threw open his gardens, in order that they 

might witness such sights, found Nero himself among them dressed 

in the garb of a charioteer2—the ancient equivalent of a jockey. If 

the Christians were really magicians, as their punishments implied,* 

and their stories of healings may have suggested, the situation was 

too serious for such buffoonery. Nero’s conduct was enough to dis- 

credit his plea of reasons of state. 

It is clear, then, that Christians, who confessed their Christianity 
or were denounced as Christians by such confessors, were put to 
death by Nero after the great fire of Rome in a.p. 64. It was alleged 
that they were incendiaries or magicians, but these allegations were 
not proven. The reference to the execution of the founder of the 
sect suggests that they were, in accordance with that precedent, liable 
to capital punishment in Rome or in the provinces. 

Suetonius records that under Nero many practices were severely 
punished and prohibited and many others set up. No food was 
henceforth to be sold in the cook shops (for example) except vege- 
tables ; and punishments were inflicted upon the Christians—a kind 
of men who embraced a new and maleficent superstition.* 

The natural inference that Nero’s action in the matter of the 
Christians formed a precedent which was followed generally and in 
the provinces unless further regulations were introduced by himself or 
his successors, is probable in the nature of the case, and it is expressly 
asserted by Sulpicius Severus, who follows Tacitus, and may have 
known parts of his Annals which are no longer extant. This, he 
says, was the beginning of the savage treatment of the Christians. 


1 Annals: “ pereuntibus addita ludibria, ut ferarum tergis contecti, laniatu canum 
interirent, aut crucibus affixi, aut flammandi, atque ubi defecisset dies in usum 
nocturni luminis urerentur.. . Unde. . . miseratio oriebatur, tamquam non utili- 
tate publica sed in saevitiam unius absumerentur.”’ 

* [bid.: ‘‘ Hortos suos ei spectaculo Nero obtulerat et Circense ludicrum edebat, 
habitu aurigae permixtus plebi vel circulo insistens’’. 

3So Ramsay, Church in the Roman Emfpire, p. 236: ‘‘ Odium humani generis 
was, as Arnold aptly points out, the crime of poisoners and magicians. . . . The 
punishments inflicted on the Christians under Nero are those ordered for magicians. 
Paulls, Sentent. v. 23 M.: ‘‘ Magicae artis conscios summo supplicio afflici placuit, 
id est, bestiis obici aut cruci suffigi. Ipsi autem magi vivi exuruntur.”’ 

4 Vita Neronis, xvi.: ‘“* Multa sub eo et animadversa severe et coercita nec minus 
instituta . . . interdictum, ne quid in popinis cocti praeter legumina aut holera 
veniret cum antea nullum non obsonii genus proponeretur; adflicti suppliciis 
Christiani, genus hominum superstition's novae ac maleficae.” 


28 INTRODUCTION 


Afterwards also laws were laid down by which the religion was pro- 
scribed and edicts were issued by which it was publicly declared 
illegal to be a Christian. Then Paul and Peter were condemned to 
death. 

To the three first persecutors of the Church—Nero, Domitian, 
and Trajan—Sulpicius Severus suggests that Titus should be added. 
If he is following good authority—say, Tacitus, here as elsewhere— 
Titus held a council to decide the fate of the Temple, when Jerusalem 
was taken in a.p. 70. Of his councillors some urged that a con- 
secrated house famous beyond all mortal things ought not to be 
destroyed. Its preservation would bear witness to Roman modera- 
tion; its ruin would be an eternal mark of their cruelty. Others, 
and among them Titus himself, held the Temple should be destroyed 
at once, in order that the religion of the Jews and Christians might 
be more completely undone; inasmuch as these religions, though 
opposed to one another, nevertheless came from the same parent 
stock. The Christians sprang from the Jews. If the root were 
taken away the branch would naturally perish.” 

From this survey of the evidence it appears that the non-Christian 
authorities bear out the assertion of Tertullian that from the year 64 
A.D. Christianity was distinguished from Judaism and, therefore, pro- 
scribed. It had lost the protection of the ancient and famous lawful 
religion, which sheltered it at the first.2 Nero set the law in motion 
against it for his own purposes and attempted to justify his action 
to the people. But such action once taken, persecution of the 
Church was part of the law of the Empire, as Suetonius, Sulpicius 
Severus, and Tertullian aver.t There is nothing in the evidence to 


1Chronicon, ii. 29: ‘‘ Hoc initio in Christianos saeviri coeptum. Post etiam 
datis legibus religio vetebatur, palamque edictis propositis Christianum esse non 
licebat. Tum Paulus et Petrus capitis damnati.” 

2 Chronicorum, ii. 30 : “ Fertur Titus adhibito consilio prius deliberasse an templum 
tanti operis everteret. Etenim nonnullis videbatur aedem sacratam ultra omnia 
mortalia illustrem non oportere deleri, quae servata modestiae Romanae testimonium, 
diruta perennem crudelitatis notam praeberet. At contra alii et Titus ipse evertendum 
imprimis templum censebant, quo plenius Judaeorum et Christianorum religio 
tolleretur: quippe has religiones, licet contrarias sibi, isdem tamen ab auctoribus 
profectas: Christianos ex Judaeis extitisse: radice sublata stirpem facile perituram.” 

3 Tertullian, Apology, xxi.: ‘‘ Antiquissimis Judaecorum instrumentis sectam. . . 
suffultam . . . sub umbraculo insignissimae religionis certe licitae”’. 

4In addition to passages quoted above, see Tertullian, ad Nationes, i. 7: “ Prin- ἡ 
cipe Augusto nomen hoc ortum est: Tiberio disciplina eius inluxit: sub Nerone 
damnatio invaluit ut iam hinc de persona persecutoris ponderetis, si pius ille princeps, 
impii Christiani. . . si non hostis publicus, nos publici hostes: quales simus dam- 
nator ipse demonstravit, utique aemula sibi puniens: et tamen permansit erasis 


INTRODUCTION 29 


suggest thatthe Neronian persecution slackened, because the citizens 
‘of Rome saw through the pretexts of arson and witchcraft. On the 
‘contrary the evidence suggests that the name was condemned by 
Nero. 

It was still possible for Titus and for Dio Cassius to recall the 
fact that Christianity was a sect—a schismatic sect of Judaism. 
Perhaps the condemnation of the sect carried with it a partial pro- 
‘scription and prohibition of its name. But there is no trace of any 
real change of attitude between the policy, on which Nero embarked 
in sudden desperation, and the action taken by Pliny, when he began 
to put the affairs of Bithynia in order. Pliny assumed that the name 
-of Christian was proof of guilt and only inquired why, when he found 
himself dealing with special and extenuating circumstances. Nero 
in special circumstances had sought to save himself from popular 
suspicion by making the name of Christian proof, first of special and 
then of general guilt. 

It remains to examine the relations of the Christian Church and 
‘the Roman State, as they are reflected in the First Epistle of St. 
Peter, and to inquire which of the first three persecutions known to 
us they best fit. 

In the first part of the Epistle, which ends at iv. 11, the writer 
speaks generally of manifold temptations.! ‘‘ He exhorteth them — 
to quote the summary of the revisers of 1611—from the breach of 
charity . . . he beseecheth them also to abstain from fleshly lusts, 
to be obedient to magistrates, and teacheth servants how to obey 
their masters, patiently suffering for well-doing after the example of 
‘Christ. He teacheth the duty of wives and husbands to each other, 
exhorting all men to unity and love, and to suffer persecution... . 
He exhorteth them to cease from sin by the example of Christ, and 
the consideration of the general end that now approacheth. . . . 

In the second part of the Epistle the writer “ comforteth them 
against persecution. He exhorteth the elders to feed their flocks, 
the younger to obey, and all to be sober, watchful, and constant in 
the faith : to resist the cruel adversary the devil.’’ Here only it is sug- 
gested that Christians may be put to death forthe Name. For certain 
churches, to whom the bearer would read this part of the letter and 
whose special circumstances the writer had in mind, a trial? was im- 
minent : their adversary the devil was walking about, as a roaring lion, 


-omnibus hoc solum institutum Neronianum: iustum denique, ut dissimile sui 


-auctoris’’. 
1i, 6. 2 iv. 12. 


30 INTRODUCTION 


seeking whom he might devour. In the earlier and general part the 
references to persecution and persecutors are vaguer, and stress is- 
laid upon the railing or reviling? to which the Christians are exposed, 

but must not retaliate in kind. In both parts the example of Christ 

is put before them as their model—He suffered and they must suffer- 
as He suffered—but only in the second part is it added that they 

must commit the keeping of their souls to God, as He did. The 

first part, in fact, does not seem to contemplate state-persecution so- 
much as the discredit and discomfort inevitably incurred by those 

who dissent from an established religion. 

But such a distinction between the two parts of the Epistle, even 
if it be accepted as valid, does not relegate the second part to a later- 
period. In some of the Churches of Asia Minor, at any rate—and 
there is no evidence to show which—the conditions described in the 
second part existed already. And so the evidence of the Epistle as. 
a whole must be taken. 

The faith of the Christians addressed is undergoing atrial: fora 
season (if need be) they are in heaviness through manifold tempta- 
tions. In different ways their faith is being tested. The tests— 
whatever they are—cause a temporary grief in the midst of their 
permanent joy, but will only refine their faith and purge it of dross. - 
Half-hearted Christians will fall away. They have already purified. 
their souls by obedience to the truth revealed to them,® and must 
lay aside all malice and all guile and hypocrisies and envies and all 
evil speakings.6 They must abstain from fleshly lusts which war- 
against the soul, and, by their good conduct, refute the common 
rumour which speaks of them as evildoers.’ Pending the visitation 
of God, they are exhorted to be obedient to the Emperor and his 
officers, and as loyal citizens stop the mouths of ignorant fools. 
There is no room, here, for the later test of their loyalty : the writer- 
could not exhort them to offer sacrifice toCzsar. No one can really 
harm them, if they obey these commands; but they may have to- 
suffer for righteousness’ sake. They must not be afraid. They 
must be ready to defend themselves and to reply to every one who 
inquires about their hope. Good behaviour and gentle answers may 
put their calumniators to shame ; in any case it is essential.!° 

In certain places Christians are already sharing in the sufferings. 
of Christ, and therefore must rejoice therein. Their suffering may 
be misrepresented as the just punishment of murderers, thieves,. 


Ἐν: 8. 2 iii. g with 11. 21-23. 3 iv. 19 with ii. 23. 41, GF. 
ΝΣ βὰν αι Set ete. ors. 9 iii. 13 f. iii. 15 ἢ 


INTRODUCTION 21 


criminals or busybodies: they must correct by word or deed all such 
misrepresentations and make it clear that they are reproached—or 
what not ?—simply because they are Christians.1 Their adversary 
the devil—in the persons of all his agents—goes about seeking whose 
faith he may destroy; they must resist him and survive the ordeal.? 
Throughout the world the Christian brotherhood is exposed to the 
same temptations and varied persecutions. 

From this evidence Professor Ramsay 3 concludes that the Epistle 
belongs to the time when Vespasian revived the policy of Nero. 
‘‘ The Christian communities of Asia Minor north of the Taurus are 
regarded as exposed to persecution (i. 6), not merely in the form of 
dislike and malevolence on the part of neighbours, . . . but persecu- 
tion to the death (iv. 15, 16), after trial and question (iii. 15). The 
persecution is general, and extends over the whole Church (v. 9). 
The Christians are not merely tried when a private accuser comes 
forward against them, but are sought out for trial by the Roman 
officials (v. 8, iii. 15). They suffer for the Name (iv. 14-16) pure 
and simple; the trial takes the form of inquiry into their religion, 
giving them the opportunity of ‘ glorifying God in this name’.” 

Of this persecution by Vespasian there is no evidence except an 
inference from the statement of Sulpicius Severus, that Titus his 
son and successor wished to exterminate both Judaism and Christi- 
anity, and the general deduction from the letter of Pliny, that 
persecution for the Name was an established practice. Apart from 
this objection, it may fairly he said that even the rigorous interpre- 
tation which Professor Ramsay puts upon different passages is not 
necessarily inconsistent with the conditions of the reign of Nero 
when persecution of the Church did, as a fact, begin. If the vague 
terms, in which the various sufferings of Christians are described, are 
to be pressed and limited to mean State persecution and persecu- 
tion to the death, there still remain indubitable references to un- 
official persecution which did not go to such lengths. The author, 
as Professor Ramsay himself says, looks forward to a period of 
persecution as the condition in which Christians have to live. 
Further he exhorts Christians to be loyal subjects and therein 
proves that the obvious test of loyalty had not yet been applied to 
them. And he definitely excludes the narrow interpretation of the 
roaring lion, when he urges the Christians to resist it. 

For these and other reasons, Professor Ramsay’s theory is re- 


liv 13-16. aye Si ὩΣ 
3 The Church in the Roman Empire, pp. 279 ff. 


32 INTRODUCTION 


jected by Dr. Chase on the one hand and Professor Schmiedel’ on 
the other. But many of his arguments hold good against the date 
under Trajan, to which Professor Schmiedel adheres. Pliny’s cor- 
respondence with Trajan, however, is not easily made to fit the state 
of things reflected in the First Epistle of St. Peter. For one thing, 
in Pliny’s time Bithynia was so far infected by real or nominal 
Christianity that the temples were deserted. The unlawful super- 
stition was so far predominant that many of its adherents conformed 
without any conviction. Pliny’s anticipation that clemency shown 
to such penitents would result in the annihilation of Christianity 
suggests an altogether different state of things. 

On the whole—whether St. Peter perished under Nero or, as 
Professor Ramsay urges, at a later date—the Epistle may not un- 
reasonably be referred to the time when Nero inaugurated the 
attack upon the provincial Roman Christians and gave the cue to all 
provincial governors who wished to earn his favour by endorsing the 
rightfulness of his action under whatever pretext. Already they were 
distinguished from the Jews, and, therefore, stood under the ban of 
the law as an unlicensed corporation. They were magicians who 
prophesied the destruction of the world, and the fire of Rome was 
proof of their power. They might plead innocence of crimes associ- 
ated with the name by vulgar suspicion ; but even when they cleared 
their name it was in itself sufficient to condemn them. That is the 
pagan view. The Christian view is that Christ suffered and they 
must follow in His steps. No colour must be given to the misrepre- 
sentations of their enemies. They must take every opportunity of 
removing them. This done, though death be their penalty, they 
will die to the glory of God, resisting the slanderer and remaining 
firm in their faith. 


CANONICITY. 


There are two different ways of treating the fact that any given 
book of the New Testament Canon is first quoted as authoritative 
Scripture and as the work of its commonly reputed author by a later 
writer of known date and recognised authority. You may say that 
the said book is thereby recognised as canonical and as authentic 
either not before or as early as such and such a date. In the former 
case the endorsement of tradition is regarded as an innovation, in 
the latter as an explicit regularisation of previous, but inarticulate, 
practice. 


1 Encyclopedia Biblica, vol. i.: ‘‘ Christian, name of”. 


INTRODUCTION 33 


The former interpretation of such facts has the advantage of 
appearing to appeal to what is apparent and to nothing else. But it 
involves axioms which require to be proved. We must suppose that 
the Canon was definitely fixed by authority and was not a thing of 
gradual growth. And, if we are to argue from the silence of ec- 
clesiastical writers, we must ignore the fact that many of them are 
no longer extant and postulate for them an interest in such matters 
as canonicity equal to our own. In fact it seems more reasonable to 
allow ourselves the exercise of a sober imagination in dealing with the 
evidence. In the case of 1 Peter at all events there is no sign of any 
attempt to force a new forgery upon the acceptance of the Church. 
It contains no innovation of doctrine such as might need the support 
of Apostolic authority. 

The Epistle, then (we may say), is used by Irenzus as early as 
the third quarter of the second century. Behind Irenzeus in all 
probability there lies a period, in which the idea of the New Testa- 
ment Canon grew up and in which its contents were gradually reduced 
for reasons which appeared to those in authority to be adequate. Of 
that period we certainly do not know everything. All the Gnostics 
whom Irenzeus has pilloried are represented only by fragments and 
summaries of their doctrines contemptuously preserved by their 
opponents at a latertime. But, even so, it appears that the Gnostics 
in their efforts to elucidate the philosophy of the Christian religion 
and to advance to something higher than the somewhat pedestrian 
and commonplace theology of the ordinary ecclesiastic laid stress 
upon Scripture. And in so far as they tended to relegate the Old 
Testament to a definitely inferior place in the development of true 
religion they necessarily devoted themselves to the writings of the 
Apostles—the Scriptures of the New Testament. Inevitably the 
Gospels, which contained the sayings of Jesus, and the works of St. 
Paul occupied the first place in their estimation. The Lord and the 
Apostle exercised an authority to which the Church must bow. So 
the Gnostics applied themselves to New Testament exegesis—not 
always for the purposes of theological controversy. The controversies, 
which ensued upon the deductions they drew from such exegesis, led 
to the delimitation of the Canon and there is a strong presumption 
in favour of the traditional view of the books which survived the 
ordeal. 1 Peter is not a book which was likely to be much to the 
mind of daring thinkers who could discriminate between the different 
degrees of inspiration latent in different sayings of the Lord and who 
were determined to be done with Judaism. The Gnostics professed 
to be wiser than the Apostles—Irenzeus their posthumous conqueror 


34 IN‘ RODUCTION 


asserts. 1 Peter isa book more congenial to such a man as Polycarp, 
who was more fitted to be a simple recipient of the general tradition. 
And it is to be remembered that Polycarp takes us back to a time 
when the idea of a Canon of New Testament Scripture was in its 
infancy. 

Our document is first quoted with the formula Peter or Peter in 
his Epistle says in the latter part of the second century. 

Irenzeus, the disciple of Polycarp, whose book Against Heresies 
was written while Eleutherus was Bishop of Rome (a.p, 175-189),1 
is the earliest witness to its reception as such. He appealed to it 
(for example) along with Paul and Isaiah : “ et Petrus ait in epistula : ? 
Quem non videntes diligitis, inquit, in quem nunc non videntes credi- 
distis, gaudebitis gaudio inenarrabili’’.8 In another place it is quoted 
after Moses and the Lord: “et propter hoc Petrus, ait, non vela- 
mentum malitiae habere nos libertatem* sed ad probationem et 
manifestationem fidei”. 

Tertullian, a little later, puts Peter on a level with Paul in respect 
of his inspiration, and explains their agreement as due to the fact 
that they were inspired by the same spirit: “de modestia quidem 
cultus et ornatus aperba praescriptio est etiam Petri cohibentis eodem 
ore quia eodem et spiritu quo Paulus, et vestium gloriam et auri 
superbiam et crinium lenoniam operositatem”’.® In his Antidote to 
the poison of the Gnostics, which may perhaps be dated a.p. 218, 
he cites 1 Peter as addressed to the natives of Pontus: “ Petrus 
quidem ad Ponticos, Quanta enim, inquit, gloria si non ut delin- 
quentes puniamini, sustinetis. Haec enim gratia est, in hoc et vocati 
estis, quoniam et Christus passus est pro nobis, relinquens vobis 
exemplum semetipsum, uti adsequamini vestigia ipsius. Et rursus 
Dilecti ne expavescatis ultionem quae agitur in vobis in temptationem, 
quasi novum accidat vobis; etenim secundum quod communicatis 
passionibus Christi, gaudete, uti et in revelatione gloriae etus gau- 
deatis exultantes: st dedecoramini nomine Christi, beati estis, quo- 
niam gloria et dei spiritus requiescat in vobis, dum ne quis vestrum 
patiatur, ut homicida aut fur aut maleficus aut alieni speculator. 
Si autem ut Christianus, ne erubescat, glorificet autem dominum in 
nomine isto.® 


14 viv δωδεκάτῳ τόπω τὸν τῆς ἐπισκοπῆς ἀπὸ τῶν ᾿Αποστόλων κατέχει κλῆρον 
᾿Ελεύθερος.᾽ Irenzus, Adv. Haer., iii. 3. 3 (Harvey’s edition). 

2 Adv. Haer. iv. 19, 2 = 1 Peter i. 8. 3 Adv. Haer. iv. 28. 41 Peter it. 16, 

5 De Oratione, xv. referring to 1 Peter iii. 3 and Tim. ii. 9; compare Clement of 
Alexandria, Paedagogus, III., xi. 66, quoted above. 

6 Scorpiace xii. = 1 Peter ii. 20, 21 and iv. 12-15. 


INTRODUCTION 35 


Clement of Alexandria (A.p. 150-(?) 210) commented on 1 Peter 
in his Hypotyposes, but the commentary is only preserved in a 
Latin abridgment.! In his extant works he quotes freely from the 
Epistle and uses it as if it were familiar to his readers. In the 
Paedagogus* (for example), which is addressed to catechumens, he 
SayS: ἐγνωκότες οὖἦ TO ἑκάστου ἔργον, ἐν φόβῳ τὸν τῆς 
παροικίας ὑμῶν χρόνον ἀναστράφητε, εἰδότες ὅτι οὐ 
φθαρτοῖς, ἀργυρίῳ ἢ χρυσίῳ, ἐλυτρώθημεν ἐκ τῆς μα- 
ταίας ἡμῶν ἀναστροφῆς πατριπαραδότου, ἀλλὰ τιμίῳ 
αἵματι ὡς ἀμνοῦ ἀμώμου καὶ ἀσπίλου Χριστοῦ. ἀρκε- 
τὸς οὖν ὁ παρεληλυθὼς χρόνος---ὁ Πέτρος φησί---τὸ βούλημα 
τῶν ἐθνῶν κατειργάσθαι, πεπορευμένους ἐν ἀσελγείαις, 
ἐπιθυμίαις, οἰνοφλυγίαις, κώμοις, πότοις. καὶ ἀθεμίτοις 
ἐιδωλολατρείαις.3 Andin the Stromateis,* which were intended 
for more advanced Christians, he has, after quotations from the 
Second Epistle to the Corinthians: διὸ καὶ ὁ θαυμάσιος Πέτρος φησίν" 
ἀγαπητοί, παρακαλῶ ὡς παροίκους καὶ παρεπιδήμους 
ἀπέχεσθαι τῶν σαρκικῶν ἐπιθυμιῶν, αἵτινες στρατεύον- 
ται κατὰ τῆς Ψυχῆς, τὴν ἀναστροφὴν ὑμῶν καλὴν 
ἔχοντες ἐν τοῖς ἔθνεσιν. ὅτι οὕτως ἐστι τὸ θέλημα τοῦ 
θεοῦ, ἀγαθοποιοῦντας φιμοῦν τὴν τῶν ἀφρόνων ἀνθρώπων 
ἐργασίαν, ὡς ἐλεύθεροι καὶ μὴ ὡς ἐπικάλυμμα ἔχοντες 
τῆς κακίας τὴν ἐλευθερίαν, GAN ὡς δοῦλοι θεοῦ. On 
one occasion® he fuses together the sumptuary laws for women 
laid down by St. Paul and St. Peter: προσιέναι δὲ αὐτὰς 6 παιδάγωγος 
κελεύει ἐν καταστολῇ κοσμίῳ, μετὰ αἰδοῦς καὶ σωφροσύνης κοσμεῖν 
ἑαυτάς" ὑποτασσομένας τοῖς ἰδίοις ἀνδράσιν, ὡς καὶ 
εἴ τινες ἀπειθοῖεν τῷ λόγῳ, διὰ τῆς τῶν γυναικῶν ἀν- 
αστροφῆς ἄνευ λόγου κερδηθήσονται, ἐποπτεύσαντες, 
φησί, τὴν ἐν λόγῳ ἁγνὴν ἀναστροφήν ὑμῶν: ὧν ἔστω 
οὐχ ὁ ἔξωθεν ἐμπλοκῆς καὶ περιθέσεως χρυσίων ἢ ἐν- 
δύσεως ἱματίων κόσμος, ἀλλ᾽ 6 κρυπτὸς τῆς καρδίας 
ἄνθρωπος ἐν τῷ ἀφθάρτῳ τοῦ πραέος καὶ ἡσυχίου πνεύ- 
ματος, 6 ἔστιν ἐνώπιον τοῦ θεοῦ πολυτελές. This fusion 
is characteristic: both St, Paul and St. Peter wrote Scripture, and 
Clement follows popular usage, which never has insisted upon a nice 
‘discrimination between the authors of “texts”. Indeed in another 
place ὃ he refers part of the first Epistle to Timothy? to St. Peter: 


1 Potter’s edition, pp. 1006 ἢ, 2TIL, xii. 85. 31 Peter i. 17-19, iv. 3. 
SEY sy xe 75. 5 Paedagogus, III., xi. 66. Sr Tim. ii. 9. 
41 Peter iii. 1-4. 8 Paedagogus, II., xii, 127. 9 Tim. ii. g f. 


36 INTRODUCTION 


πάνυ γοῦν θαυμασίως ὁ Πέτρος ὁ μακάριος γυναῖκας, φησίν, ὥσαυτως μὴ ἐν’ 
πλέγμασιν ἢ χρυσῷ ἢ μαργαρίταις ἢ ἱματισμῷ πολυτελεῖ, ἀλλ᾽ ὃ πρεπει 
γυναιξὶν ἐπαγγελλομέναις θεοσέβειαν, δι᾽ ἔργων ἀγαθῶν σφᾶς αὐτὰς κοσ- 
μούσων. 

The fact of the matter is that even Clement used, at any rate in 
his Paedagogus, manuals of extracts from Scripture classified 
according to their subjects. His Paedagogus or instructor is the 
distinguished successor of a line of humbler books of the same kind. 
The Christian catechist had his armoury of appropriate texts just as 
the missionary to the Jews had his. The extracts were arranged 
under headings: sayings of Moses, the Prophet, the Psalmist, the 
Sage, the Lord and the Apostle followed each other in various. 
orders and with different degrees of precision in attribution. The 
inevitable results were that the extracts were affected by their new 
neighbours in respect of their text, and that their proper ascrip- 
tion was lost sight of. As the learning and the security of the 
Church increased, these results were corrected. Complete Bibles 
in the Church chests superseded the manuals, and Origen (for ex- 
ample) laboured to restore the purity of the text. The new 
state of things is reflected in the Stromateis of Clement: there 
Jesus Son of Sirach receives credit for his wisdom, which in the 
Paedagogus is ascribed to wisdom, the Paedagogue, or Solomon; 
and the text of the extracts conforms to the standard of the uncial 
manuscripts. But the literature which preceded Clement was 
popular rather than scholarly, and the phenomena presented by 
his use of Scripture in the Paedagogus contribute to confirm 
the conclusion that the argument based upon the silence of his. 
predecessors is fallacious, and that their silence can fairly be 
construed as a denial of the Petrine origin or authorship of 1 
Peter. 

These examples of the use of 1 Peter made by Irenzus, Tertullian, 
and Clement of Alexandria have been given in full to show what the 
raw material of the evidence really is. Samples only as they are, they 
suffice to show that 1 Peter was recognised as St. Peter’s Epistle 
about A.D. 200 in Gaul, Africa, and Alexandria. By a stretch of the 
imagination it might be supposed that Tertullian was dependent upon 
Clement for this knowledge; but Irenzus and Clement represent 
a tradition which they inherited independently from a distant past. 
Now Clement was the earliest Christian scholar, whose works have 
come down to us, and Irenzus is linked to the apostolic age by his. 
connexion with Polycarp. 

In his Epistle to the Philippians, Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, 


INTRODUCTION a7 


who died a martyr on 23rd February, a.p. 155 at the age of 86 years,! 
has left, as Eusebius noted, a valuable witness to the earlier history 
of the New Testament Canon. 

So far as the Canonicity of 1 Peter is concerned the evidence of 
the Epistle is overwhelming. It is true that Polycarp does not give 
the name of the authority, which he uses so often. It would be un- 
reasonable to expect that he should. ‘‘ Paul” and ‘‘the Lord” are 
the only authors named. The words of the Lord have naturally a 
higher authority than those of His Apostles—at any rate at this stage 
in the development of the Canon. And St. Paul as the founder of 
the Church at Philippi had a special claim upon their obedience: 
‘Neither I (Polycarp says) nor anyone like me can attain to the 
wisdom of the blessed and glorious Paul, who, when he came among 
you, before the face of the men of that time taught accurately and 
surely the word of truth, who also when he was absent wrote letters 
to you into which if you look you will be able to be built up in the 
faith given unto you.”? Other Scriptures, even the first Epistle of 
St. John, Polycarp’s teacher, are used just as 1 Peter is used— 
anonymously and not always with a clear formula to stamp the 
quotations as quotations. 

The following passages contain clear cases of Polycarp’s use of 
1 Peter :— 

(1. 1-3) συνεχάρην . . . ὅτι ἡ βεβαία Ths πίστεως ὑμῶν ῥίζα. . . μεχρὶ 
νῦν διαμένει καὶ καρποφορεῖ εἰς τὸν κύριον ἡμῶν ᾿Ιησοῦν Χριστὸν . .. 
εἰς ὃν οὐκ ἰδόντες πιστεύετε χαρᾷ ἀνεκλαλήτῳ 
καὶ δεδοξασμέν ῃ εἰς ἣν πολλοὶ ἐπιθυμοῦσιν εἰσελθεῖν.“ 

Il. διὸ ἀναζωσάμενοι τὰς ὀσφύας ὑμῶνϑ δουλεύσατε τῷ 
θεῷ. . . πιστεύσαντες εἰς τὸν ἐγείραντα τὸν κύριον ἡμῶν 
Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν ἐκ νεκρῶν καὶ δόντα αὐτῷ δόξαν καὶ 
θρόνον ἐκ δεξιῶν αὐτοῦ... μὴ ἀποδιδόντες κακὸν ἀντ 
κακοῦ ἢ λοιδορίαν ἀντὶ λοιδορίας ἢ γρόνθον ἀντὶ 
γρόνθου ἢ κατάραν ἀντὶ κατάρας.ὃ 

Ν. καλὸν γὰρ τὸ ἀνακόπτεσθαι ἀπὸ τῶν ἐπιθυμιῶν τῶν ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ, ὅτι 
πᾶσα ἐπιθυμία κατὰ τοῦ πνεύματος στρατεύεται." 

VII. ἐπὶ τὸν ἐξ ἀρχῆς ἡμῖν παραδοθέντα λόγον ἐπιστρέψωμεν νήφοντες 
πρὸς τὰς ἐυχὰς 19 καὶ προσκαρτεροῦντες νηστείαις. 


1850 Bardenhewer, Geschichte der Altkirchlichen Litteratur, i. p. 140. 


Sythe S"Epbeter 1: 8. 4 Compare 1 Peter i. 12. bin Peter 1. 3: 
Ore Reteni.) 21. Ty Peter ili. 9. 8 Compare 1 Peter ili. 9. 
91 Peter ii. τὶ conflated with Galatians v. 17. 10‘Peter iv. 7: 


VOL. V. 3 


38 INTRODUCTION 


VIII. προσκαρτερῶμεν τῇ ἐλπίδι ἡμῶν καὶ τῷ ἀρραβῶνι τῆς δικαιοσύνης 
ἡμῶν, ὅς ἐστιν Χριστὸς Ἰησοῦς, ὃς ἀνήνεγκεν ἡμῶν τὰς 
ἁμαρτίας τῷ ἰδίῳ σώματι ἐπὶ τὸ ξύλον, ὃς ἀμαρτίαν 
οὐκ ἐποίησεν, οὐδὲ εὑρέθη δόλος ἐν τῷ στόματι 
attod.” ἀλλὰ δι ἡμᾶς, ἵνα ζήσωμεν ἐν αὐτῷ, πάντα ὑπέμεινεν. 
μιμηταὶ οὖν γενώμεθα τῆς ὑπομονῆς αὐτοῦ καὶ ἐὰν πάσχωμεν 
διὰ τὸ ὄνομα αὐτοῦ, δοξάζωμεν αὐτόν.3 τοῦτον γὰρ 
ἡμῖν τὸν ὑπογραμμὸν ἔθηκε δι᾿ ἑαυτοῦ, καὶ ἡμεῖς 
τοῦτο ἐπιστεύσαμεν." 

X. In his ergo state et domini exemplar sequimini firmi im fide 
et inmutabiles, fraternitatis amatores diligentes invicem. .. .° 
Omnes vobis invicem subiecti estote,® conversationem vestram 
inreprehensibilem habentes in gentibus, ut ex bonis operibus 
vestris et vos laudem accipiatis et dominus in vobis non 


blasphemetur.? 
1y Peter ii. 24. 31 Peter ii. 22. 
31 Peter iv. 16. 43 Peter ii. 21. 
5 Compare 1 Peter iii. 8 (ii. 17). δ Compare 1 Peter v. 5. 
Ρ 7 Ρ 


Τὰ Peter ii. 12: the paraphrase of the latter part οἵ the verse (ἐποπτεύοντες 
δοξάσωσι τὸν θεόν) is due to the next quotation (Isaiah 111. 5), vae autem, per quem 
nomen domini blasphematur. 


NOTE. 


This edition is based on a course of lectures delivered, in the first instance, to 
a class of honours men who were expected to use the late Professor Bigg’s com- 
mentary as a text-book. The lectures were, therefore, made independently of that 
commentary and with a view to the exhibition of new material and processes rather 
than results. In particular, an attempt was made to illustrate the reference of the 
Septuagint and Jewish literature generally to the exegesis of the New Testament. 
In the reduction of these notes to their present form the commentaries of Alford, 
Bigg, Hort, Kiihl-Meyer, and Von Soden were consulted. 

The text is taken from the facsimile of the great Vatican Codex (B), the lines 
of which are indicated by spaces. 

The editor gratefully acknowledges the kindness of the Rev. George Milligan 
D.D., and the Rev. R. St. John Parry, B.D., who read the commentary in proof. 


“rérpov A. 


ΠΕΤΡΟΣ ἀπόστολος 


σπορᾶς Πόντου Γαλατίας Καπ 


l@ X01 ἐκλεκτοῖς παρε 


πιδήμοις δια- 1. τ 
παδοκίας ᾿Ασίας κατὰ 2 


110 Χὥ is the normal contraction of Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ : so KY = κυρίου, OF = Θεοῦ. 
After ᾿Ασίας all other manuscripts and all the versions add καὶ βιθυνίας : the original 
scribe of Codex Vaticanus (B*) stands alone in the omission, 


CHAPTER I.—Vv.1,2. Peter the High 
Commissioner of Jesus, who is Messiah 
of Greeks as of Jews, sends greeting 
after the Christian fashion, in which the 
Greek and Jewish formule have been 
combined and transformed, to the 
Churches of Northern Asia Minor. 
They are the dispersion of the New 
Israel, chosen out of the whole world in 
accordance with God’s foreknowledge 
of their fitness, to undergo the hallow- 
ing of His Spirit, and with a view to 
their reception into His Church. For 
the result, and therefore the purpose, of 
their election is that they may profess 
obedience and receive the outward sign 
of sprinkling, being baptised into the 
death of Jesus Christ. For them may 
grace (and not mere greeting) and peace 
{God’s peace not man’s) be multiplied! 
For discussion of writer and readers see 
Introduction. 


νει. :. ἐκλεκτοῖς παρεπι δή p- 
οις διασπορᾶς, elect sojourners of 
dispersion, a combination of titles of 
Israel appropriated to Christians in ac- 
cordance with the universal principle of 
the early Church. (i.) The Jews were 
the chosen race (ii. 9 from Isa. xliii. 20) 
as Moses said, Because He loved thy 
fathers therefore He chose their seed after 
them (Deut. iv. 37; cf. Rom. xi. 28). So 
Jesus said to His disciples, I have chosen 
you (John xv. 16, 19, etc.), and refers to 
them in the eschatological discourse as 
the elect (Mark xiii. 20). (ii.) Being 
chosen out of the world—in the world, 
indeed, but not of it, John xv. 16 ff.— 
Christians are alien sojourners during 
their life on earth. Their fatherland is 
the city that hath foundations (i.7, ii. 11; 


Heb. xiii. 14; Phil. iii. 20), In Heb. xi. 
g-13 the Patriarchs are credited with the 
same idea and Philo says that the sages 
of Moses’ school are all introduced as 
sojourners (p. 416 M). So Abraham said 
to the Sons of Heth, “1 am astranger and 
sojourner (πάροικος kal παρεπίδημος = 


SWNT Δ) with you” (Gen. xxiii. 4); 
Jacob speaks of the days of the years of 
my pilgrimage (ΛΔ ἃς παροικῶ) ; 
and the Psalmist anticipates Peter and 
Heb. in the generalisation I am a 
stranger and sojourner (πάροικος καὶ 
παρεπίδημος) in the earth as all my 
fathers were (Ps. xxxix. 13). Deissmann 
(Bible Studies, p. 149) quotes two ex- 
amples of παρεπίδημος from wills of the 
third century B.c., one of a Jew resident 
in the Fayyiim (Ἀπολλώνιον [παρεπ]ΐδη- 
pov ὃς καὶ συριστὶ ᾿Ιωνάθας). In P. Tor. 
8 (B.c. 118) παρεπιδημοῦντες and κατοι- 
κοῦντες are contrasted. (iii.) Moses 
said to Israel thou shalt be scattered 
among the kingdoms of the earth (Deut. 
Xxvill. 25) ; and the rendering of the LXX 
διασπορά is probably the earliest ex- 
ample of the technical designation (cf. 
John vii. 35) of the Jews, who—for what- 
ever reason—lived outside the Holy 
Land. The collective term (Rabbinic 


“ΟΡ implies the real unity of these 
scattered communities, whose scattering 
is no longer regarded as God’s punish- 
ment for sin. It thus serves well the 
purpose of one, who, like St. Paul, in- 
sists on the unity of the whole brother- 
hood of Christians (¢.g., v. 9) ; but this 
application of the principle that the 
Church is the Israel of God is subordi- 
nate to others which imply that there is 


40 


πρόγνωσιν OG! πατρὸς 


καὶ ῥαντισμὸν αἵματος 


ἐν ἁγιασμῶ πνεύμα 


TIETPOY A 1: 


τος εἰς ὑπακοὴν 


ιῦ Χῦ- χάρις ὑμῖν καὶ εἰρήνη 


1 Θῷ is the normal contraction of Θεοῦ. 


no earthly correlative to it. When St. 
James addresses the twelve tribes which 
are in Dispersion, he may on the other 
hand be contrasting the saints of Jeru- 
salem with those abroad (as St. Paul did 
in the matter of the Collection) if indeed 
he is not speaking simply to his fellow- 
countrymen as a Jew to Jews. But St. 
Peter writes from ‘‘ Babylon” and the 
capital of Christendom is no longer Jeru- 
salem. The collocation of mapemt- 
δήμοις απάδιασπορ ἂς implies that 
this scattering, which in the case of 
the type was God’s punishment for sin, 
will not be permanent for the antitype. 
For the Christian Church the Jewish 
hope of the ingathering will be fulfilled, 
as is indicated by the emphatic ἐκλὰ ε- 
xtots—for Jesus said, “The Son of 
Man... shall gather together his elect 

. - from the uttermost part of the earth 
to the uttermost part of heaven” (Mark 
xili. 26, 27; cf. Deut. xxx. 4). Compare 
Didache ix. 4, ‘‘For as this was broken 
[bread] scattered over the hills and being 
gathered together became one, so may 
thy Church be gathered together from 
the ends of the earth into thy kingdom,” 
and Justin Martyr, Dial. 113, ‘As 
Moses .. . so also Jesus the Christ 
(corresponding to J., the Son of Nun) 
shall turn again the Dispersion of the 
People . . . shall give us the possession 
eternally ’’. 

Πόντου. . . ᾿Ασίας. The order 
indicates the, route of the messenger, 
who landed presumably at Sinope or 
Amastris and, if the omission of καὶ 
Βιθυνίας be accepted, left the country at 
Ephesus or Smyrna. The (Armenian) 
Acta of Phocas (Martyr of Sinope under 
Trajan) are addressed to the brethren 
dwelling in Pontus and Bithynia in 
Paphlagonia and in Mysia in Galatia and 
in Cappadocia and in Armenia (Cony- 
beare, Monuments of Early Christianity, 
p. 103). See Introduction. 

Ver.2. Thethreeclauses katTa..., 
éy ..., and eis... qualify ἐκλεκ- 
tots and perhaps also ἀπόστολος (as 
Oecumenius) Peter himself is elect and 
shares their privileges but had no need 
to magnify his office, as had St. Paul. 
Yet see Acts xv. 7 ff. 

κατὰ wpdyvwotv.... The noun 
occurs only in Acts ii. 23 (speech of St. 


Peter) in reference to the slaying of 
Christ τῇ ὡρισμένῃ βουλῇ kal προγνώσει 
τοῦ θεοῦ, cf. i. 20. The use of nouns 
instead of verbs is characteristic of this 
Epistle. The same idea is expressed 
more elaborately by St. Paul in Rom. viii. 
29 (g.v.). Cf. Origen, Philocalia, xxv. 
Oecumenius infers that the Apostle is thus. 
the equal of the prophets, especially 
Jeremiah (v. Jer. i. 5).—év ἁγιασμῷ 
πνεύματος, subjective genitive like 
θεοῦ, being elect they are within the 
sphere of the proper work of the Holy 
Spirit. The context excludes the render- 
ing hallowing of the (human) spirit. Peter 
uses the stereotyped phrase; cf. 2 Thess. 
ii. 13 (which corresponds exactly to the 
whole context) εἵλατο ὑμᾶς ὁ θεὸς ἀπ᾽ 
ἀρχῆς (κατὰ πρ. θ. π.) . . - ἐν ἅγι- 
ασμῷ πνεύματος καὶ πίστει ἄλη- 
θείας (εἰς ὑπ.).--εοἰς ὑπακοὴν - . « |. 
Χριστοῦ, the goal or purpose of their 
election. Obedience is a technical term : 
sc. to God; cf. i. 14, where it is con- 
trasted with the ignorant disobedience of 
their past lives (i. 22). As Christians, 
they obeyed God and not men (Acts iv. 
19, v. 29) ; God gives His Holy Spirit to 
them that obey Him (Acts v. 32). Com- 
pare the Pauline obedience of faith. This 
obedience implies a change of mind in 
Jew and in Gentile, which is effected by 
the sprinkling of blood of Fesus Christ. 
They are now cleansed from sin, which is 
disobedience in Jew or Gentile. Jesus. 
Christ, the mediator of the new covenant, 
sprinkles those whom God selected with 
His own blood, as Moses sprinkled the 
children of Israel who had promised 
obedience with the blood of oxen (Exod. 
xxiv. 7 f.; cf. Heb. ix. 19). But refer- 
ences to other sprinklings of the O.T.., 
unconnected with obedience, must not be 
excluded. The word ῥαντισμός is appro- 
priated, for example, to the water in 
which the ashes of the heifer were dis- 
solved (Num. xix.); and a less obvious 
explanation is supported by Barnabas, 
‘that by the remission of sins we might 
be purified, that is in the sprinkling of 
His blood for it stands written . . . ὃν 
His bruise we were healed (Isa. liii. 5)”. 
Indeed the best commentary is supplied 
by the Epistle to the Hebrews in which 
evidence of the O.T. is reviewed and the 
conclusion drawn that according to the: 


2—3. 
πληθυνθείΐη. εὐλογητὸς 6 OF! Kal πα 
xo 6 κατὰ τὸ πολὺ αὐτοῦ 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


ἔλεος ἀναγεννήσας 


41 


τὴρ τοῦ KU ἡμῶν It 3 
ἡμᾶς 2 εἰς 


1 Θὲ is the normal contraction of Θεός: so Xs = Χριστός, KS = κύριος, ἰξ -- Ἰησοῦς. 
2For ἡμᾶς a few cursives read ὑμᾶς : the words are practically interchangeable 


in manuscripts. 


law everything is cleansed by blood. All 
the types were summed up in the fulfil- 
ment (see especially Heb. ix.) whether 
they related to the Covenant or to the 
Worship. So in Heb. xii. 24 the blood 
of Abel the first martyr is drawn into the 
composite picture of typical blood shed- 
dings. It would be possible to take 
ὑπακοήν with ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, and to 
render either that ye might obey Jesus 
Christ (cf. i. 22; 2 Cor. x. 5) being 
sprinkled with His blood or that ye 
might obey as He obeyed even unto 
Meath (cf. Heb.. v. 8} Phil, 1... 8). 
χάρις . .. πληθυνθείη. This 
tull formula is found also in 2 Peter 
and Jude. For precedent see Dan. iii. 31. 
Its use here is not merely a convention 
peculiar to the Petrine school; grace and 
peace are multiplied to match the growth 
of hostility with which the Christians ad- 
dressed are confronted, lest the word of 
Jesus be fulfilled διὰ τὸ πληθυνθῆναι τὴν 
ἀνομίαν ψυγήσεται ἣ ἀγάπη τῶν πολλῶν 
(Matt. xxiv. 12); cf. Rom. v. 20 f. In 
the Pastoral Epistles ἔλεος (cf. ver. 3) is 
inserted between x. and eip., so 2 John 3. 
From Gal. vi. 16 it appears that ἔλεος 
stood originally in the place which χάρις 
usurped (as distinctively Christian and 
reminiscent of the familar χαίρειν); so 
that the source will be Num. vi. 24-26. 
κύριος . . . ἐλεήσαι σε . . - καὶ δῴη 
σοι εἰρήνην. 

Vv. 3-12. Benediction of the Name. 
The mention of God is followed by the 
Benediction of the Name as Jewish piety 
prescribed; the formula the Holy One, 
blessed be He, being amplified by the 
Christian appreciation of their fuller 
knowledge. The Apostle surpasses the 
fervour of the Psalmist, Blessed be the 
Lord God of Israel inasmuch as the last 
mighty work surpasses all previous de- 
liverances. It falls naturally into three 
divisions. Vv. 3-5 have as their central 
figure the Father, vv. 6-9 the Son, and 
vv. 10-12 the Spirit who is at last given, 
who inspired the prophets of old and now 
inspires the Christian missionaries. From 
the past which preceded their acceptance 
of God’s choice of them and its outward 
sign St. Peter turns to consider their 
present condition and to illuminate it with 
the light of the future glory. 


Vv. 3-5. Blessed be God whom we 
have come to know as the God and 
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! For 
He has granted to us the crowning mani- 
festation of His great mercy. He has 
raised Jesus Christ from the dead and us 
thereby to newness of life. So you may 
hope for and in part enjoy the inheritance 
which was prefigured by the Promised 
Land. This heavenly treasure God has 
kept for those whom He guards with 
His power. So your faith respond, He 
is guarding you for the salvation which 
will be revealed at the last. 

Ver. 3. εὐλογητός. The verbal 
adjective is recognised, perhaps coined by 
the LXX as proper to the Benediction of 
the Name. This usage is reflected in 
INV Rom: 1. 25. ἢ δὲ 5. GOK) 1.3) 
xi. 31; Eph. i. 3; note Mark xiv. 61. 
ὃ θεὸς . . - ἡμῶν, part ot the for- 
mula (cf. 2 Cor. i. 3; Eph. i. 3)—based 
on the saying “I ascend to your father 
and my father, unto your God and my 
God” (John xx. 17). κατὰ τὸ πολὺ 
ἔλεος, the more elaborate κατὰ τὸ 
πλοῦτος τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῦ of Eph. i. 7 
(cf. ii. 4). ἀναγεννήσας (cf. i. 23). 
Else the verb only occurs in N.T. as 
variant to γεννηθῇ ἄνωθεν in Old Latin 
(and Irenzeus) text of John iii. 5, which 
prompted St. Peter’s Christian use of the 
word, see especially i. 23. Later it is 
used to describe the outward sign of 
baptism (e.g., Justin Apol. 1. 51) for the 
benefit of pagans as to the limitation of 
worshippers of Isis (Apuleius, Met. xi. 26, 
ut renatus quodammodo staatim sacrorum 
obsequio desponderetur). And of Mithras 
(in aeternum renati). 


tion of the Christian corresponds to the | 


Here the regenera- | 


᾿ 


resurrection of Christ (Chrysostom on | 


John) and implies a previous mystical | 
or figurative death to sin—see 11. 24; 
iii. 17 f.; iv. 1—which is repeated in the 
practice of their unnatural virtue (iv. 1-4). 
The simple idea of regeneration underlies 
St. Paul’s elaborations of the doctrine of 
the καινὴ κτίσις. Hort refers to Philo, 
de incorruptibilitate mundi (ii. 489 M.) 
where ἀναγέννησις is used for the 
more usual mwadvyyeveota—rebirth of the 
world—of the Stoics. ἐλπίδα ζῶσαν. 
The omission of the definite article is 
characteristic of St. Peter. The Hope 


42 


4 ἐλπίδα Loca? 
νομίαν ἄφθαρτον K,” 
5 οὐρανοῖς εἰς ὑμᾶς τοὺς 


δι᾿ ἀναστάσεως ὃ XT 
ἀμίαντον καὶ ἀμάρα' 
ἐν δυνάμει OF φρου 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑᾺΑ i, 


ἐκ νεκρῶν εἰς κληρο 


τον τετηρημένην ε΄ 
ρουμένους διὰ 


1fwoo = ζῶσαν: the sign™ for ν is apt to be absorbed in the preceding line and 
so disregarded: it is used at the end of the line or sichu, whether or not the word 


in which it occurs has come to its end. 


2 is the common abbreviation for καί: 


it is probably derived from cursive writ- 


ing in which letters were joined together and so varied in shape according to their 


companions. 


is a recognised technical term (Acts 
xxiii. 6, etc.) of the Pharisees, cor- 


responding to FY. ζῶσαν stamps 


the Christian hope as Divine since life is 
God’s prerogative (cf. i. 23 and the living 
bread, water of John) and effective (cf. 
the corresponding use of dead faith, Jas. 
ii. 17, 26). Cf. Sap. iii. 4, ἢ δὲ ἐλπὶς 
αὐτῶν ἀθανασίας πλήρης. δι᾽ a. with 
ἀναγεννήσας rather than ζῶσαν: three 
prepositional clauses are thus attached to 
a. as to ἐκλεκτοῖς (and ἀπόστολος) in 
ver. 2. The resurrection of Jesus is the 
means and guarantee of the spiritual 
resurrection of the Christian (1 Cor. xv. 
14,17) from the death of the sinful and 
fleshly life. 

Ver. 4. εἰς KAnp.... ἀμάραν- 
τον, aS God’s sons in virtue of their re- 
generation they are God’s heirs (Gal. iv. 
7) and have an heavenly inheritance. 
The accumulated adjectives recall various 
images employed to describe it—and em- 
phasise the fact that it is eternal (Heb. 
ix. 15) and spiritual. It is ἄφθαρτον, in- 
corruptible (cf. i. 23, iii. 4) because it be- 
longs to the future life which the risen 
dead (x Cor. xv. 52) share with God Him- 
self (Rom. i. 23; 1 Tim. i. 17). It is set 
. where “moth doth not corrupt (διαφθεί- 
pet, Luke xii. 33: Matt. vi. 19 ff. has 
ἀφανίζει), apart from this corruptible 
world (cf. Isa. xxiv. 3). It is the incor- 
ruptible crown (x Cor. ix. 25. The 
second epithet ἀμίαντον is applied to 
the great High Priest, Heb. vil. 26 (cf. 
Heb. xiii. 4; Jas. i. 27) and implies again 
separation from this sinful world of which 
it is written ἐμιάνατε THY γῆν μον καὶ 
τὴν κληρονομίαν μου ἔθεσθε εἰς βδέ- 
λυγμα (Jer. ii. 7). Compare the descrip- 
tion of virtue in Sap. iv. 2, στεφανηφο- 
ροῦσα πομπεύει τὸν τῶν ἀμιάντων ἄθλων 
ἀγῶνα νικήσασα. ἀμάραντον is 
peculiar to 1 Peter in N.T., cf. ἀμαράντι- 
vov (v. 4): it is perhaps derived from 
Sap. vi. 12, ἀμάραντός ἐστιν ἣ σοφία, 
and thus presupposes the identification of 
eternal life with knowledge of God (John 


xvii. 3). Compare the application of Isa. 
xl. 6 f. (cited infra 24) in Jas.i.11. All 
three suit or are associated with the 
wreath presented to the victor in the 
games—a metaphor which the Lord Him- 
self used according to the Apocalypse 
(iz τὸ, οὐ ες MPeteriwiia Ss 135: ἃ 2): 
Origen (9) in Cramer’s Catena notes that 
the words contradict Chiliasm. τετ- 
ἠρημένην ets ὑμᾶς, reserved (τ) 
with a view to you, cf. John xii. 7, ἵνα 
eis THY ἡμέραν . .. τηρήσῃ; 2 Peter ii. 
4, εἰς κρίσιν τηρουμένους ; for same use 
of εἰς in similar context see Rom. viii. 18. 
(2). . . until you came—a sense which 
would suit the other examples of τηρεῖν 


eis. (3)... for you, eis = = dative 
(so Syriac), the writer or translator being 
influenced by eis above and below. The 
inheritance is still, as it has always been, 
kept back, but the Christians are sure to 
succeed to it. So Enoch refers to the 
secrets of the righteous which shall be 
revealed (xxxviii. 3); the lot of the right- 
eous which the Son of Man preserves 
(xlviii. 7); and says Blessed are ye ye 
righteous and elect for glorious will be 
your lot . . . it will be said to the holy 
that they should seek in heaven the 
secrets of righteousness the heritage of 
faith (Iviii. 5). 

Ver. 5. The Christians addressed are 
—to complete the metaphor from other 
passages in the Epistle—a spiritual house 
(ii. v.), which is besieged by the devil 
(v. 8) but guarded and garrisoned by God’s 
Power. So long as they have faith (v. g) 
they are safe: ‘‘ our faith lays hold upon 
this power and this power strengthens 
faith and so we are preserved” (Leigh- 
ton). Without responsive faith God’s 
power is powerless to heal or to guard (cf. 
Mark vi. 5 f. and accounts of Jesus’ mir- 
acles generally, Jas. i.6f.). The langu- 
age seems to echo Rom. i. 16, δύναμις 
θεοῦ εἰς σωτηρίαν παντὶ τῷ πιστεύοντι, 
combined with Gal. iii. 23 (cf. Phil. iv. 7) 
where also the distinctive φρουρεῖν oc- 
curs in similar context. The Power 


4—6. 


πίστε ως εἰς σωτηρίαν Erol 


éoxdtw* ἐν ὦ 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


μὴν ἀποκαλυφθῆναι 
ἀγαλλιᾶσθε ὀλίγον ἄρ 


43 


ἐν καιρῶ 
τι εἰ δέον ' λυπηθέντες 2 6 


1 Codex Alexandrinus with others adds ἐστι after Séov. 

*humnGévres is probably right, εἰ δέον being parenthetical: the variants λυτη- 
θέντας (first hand of Codex Sinaiticus and many cursives) and λυπηθῆναι (one 
cursive and the Vulgate) are due to the connexion of δέον with its context, the 
parenthetical character of the phrase being disregarded. 


(sina) of God is put for ¥ehovah 


in the Targum of Isa. xxxili. 21; and the 
corresponding use of 4 δύναμις is found in 
Mark xiv. 62 (see Dalman, 200 f.; and 
add ἣ μεγαλωσύνη; a more exact render- 
ing, of Heb. i. 3, viii. 1). In Philo God’s 
powers are personified self-manifestations. 
εἰς σωτηρίαν, «.t.r., is probably the 
third clause qualification of φρουρ. (cf. 
2, 3). Below, the salvation of souls is 
described as the goal of faith (9) ina 
passage where the ἑτοίμην, k.t.d., qualify 
σωτηρίαν rather than κληρονομίαν which 
is explained by cat. ... ἐσχάτῳ. Sal- 
vation is to St. Peter that saivation 
which is to be revealed in the future (c/. 
i. Q, ii. 2; so Rom. xiii. 11, viv ἐγγύτερον 
++. ἡ σωτηρία). Partial anticipations 
he neglects; for them as for Christ the 
glory follows the present suffering. The 
idea of the revelation of salvation comes 
from Ps. xcviii. 2 (cf. Isa. lvi. 1) which 
has influenced St. Paul also (Rom. i. 
16 f.). ἑτοίμην seems to be simply 


the equivalent of “PUY prepared, which 
St. Paul renders with more attention to 
current usage than etymology by μέλ- 
λουσαν (Rom. viii. 13; Gal. iii. 23; so 
t Peter vy. 1). This weaker sense begins 
with Deut. xxxii. 35 (LXX, πάρεστιν 
ἕτοιμα. as Peter here) and prevails in 
new Hebrew (Tarphon said. . . the re- 
compense of the reward of the righteous 


is for the time to come. sab ΓΝ 
Aboth, ii. 19). But the proper signific- 
ance of the word is recognised and utilised 
in the Parables of Jesus, Matt. xxiv. 4, 8. 
καιρῷ ἐσχάτῳ, still anarthrous as 
being technical term—indefinite as the 
time is unknown as well as in accordance 
with authors’ custom (cf. δύναμις, mo- 
τέως, σωτηριαν above) ; cf. John ii. 18. 
Vv. 6-9. Exult then. These various 
temptations to which you are exposed 
cause present grief. But they are part of 
God’s plan for you. Even material per- 
ishable gold is tried in the fire. So is 
your faith tested that it may be purged of 
its dross and the good metal be discovered 
when Jesus Christ is revealed. You love 
Him whom you never saw; though you 
see Him not you believe on Him. Exult 


then with joy that anticipates your future 
glory. You arewinning the prize of your 
faith, the ultimate salvation of souls. St. 
Peter returns to the present and regards 
it from the point of view of those whom 
God is guarding—but only to advance 
again to the glorious future (7 fin, .g) 
when Jesus Christ the present object of 
their love and faith shall be revealed. He 
is the central figure of this sectionwhich is 
based upon two of His sayings which are 
appropriate to the circumstances of these 
His persecuted followers (so iv. 13) Ὁ. 
Matt. v.12 = Apoc. xix. 7 from Ps. xxi. 1, 
cxvili. 24. Compare Jas. i. 2-4 and John 
cited below. 

Ver. 6. ἐν ᾧ. There are four possible 
antecedents. (1) καιρῷ, (2) Jesus Christ, 
(3) God, (4) the state of things described 
in 3-5. (τὴ) would imply that they must 
live in the future and is least probably 
right. (2) is supported by 8 but is un- 
likely at this point. The choice lies be- 
tween (3), God being hitherto the domin- 
ating figure; and (4): cf. Luke i. 47 = 
I Sam. 1. 1 a—a. with ἐν in LXX as well 
as ἐπὶ. ἀγαλλιᾶσθε. Indicative 
(with or without quasi future meaning) 
rather than Imperative. Bye form of 
ἀγάλλομαι (Homer downwards) first 
found in LXX especially as assonant 


rendering of 5} : used later in bad 
sense (λοιδορεῖται, Hesych): here bor- 
rowed irom Matt. v. 11 f. χαίρετε καὶ 
ἀγαλλιᾶσθε. ὀλίγον, (1) for a little 
time, or (2) to a small extent (contrast 
John xvi. 6, ἡ λύπη πεπλήρωκεν ὑμῶν 
τὴν καρδίαν). εἰ δέον, they cannot 
but fee] grief at their trials (John xvi. 20, 
ὑμεῖς λυπηθήσεσθε ἡ δὲ λύπη ὑμῶν εἰς 
χαρὰν γενήσεται), but they must not in- 
dulge their natural weakness. To take 
the ‘‘necessity” as referring to their 
trials (for not all the Saints are oppressed, 
Oec.) limits Avr. to the external sense of 
vexation without reference to the feelings 
of the grieved corresponding to the feel- 
ings implied in ay. The contrast is thus 
destroyed, but this sense harass would 
suit the other military metaphor, τοὺς 
φρουρουμένους.--ἐν ποικίλοις πει- 
ρασμοῖς, the adjective rules out the 





, 


44 IIETPOY A ἣν 


7 ἐν ποικίλοις πειρασμοῖς 
πολύυτει 3 


ἵνα τὸ δοκίμιον Spa 
μότερον χρυσοῦ τοῦ 


τῆς πίστεως 


ἀπολλυμένου διὰ πυ ρὸς δὲ 


1 For δοκίμιον three cursives read δόκιμον, a more familiar form of the adjective. 


* The εἰ in πολυτειμότερον is used in place of the conventional t to show that 
the syllable is long: so τειμήν, etc. The secondary uncials have πολὺ τιμίωτερον. 


limitation of mw. to external trials which 
St. James who has the entire phrase 
seems to put upon it. ? 
Ver. 7. τὸ δοκίμιον. The evi- 
dence of the papyri (Deissmann, Bible 
Studies, pp. 259 ff.) shows that δοκίμιος 
is a bye form of the adjective δόκιμος 
approved; so Ps. xii. 7, ἀργύριον πεπυρ- 
ὠμένον δοκίμιον (cf. τ Chron. xxxix. 4; 
Zech. xi. 3, where it occurs as v.l. for 
δόκιμον). Hence the phrase (here and 
in Jas. i. 3?) corresponds exactly to St. 
Paul’s τὸ τῆς ὑμετέρας ἀγάπης γν ἤ- 
ovtov—the genuineness of your faith 
or “the approvedness”). So Arethas 
on Apoc. ix. 4, of δὲ τὸ δοκίμιον 
ἑαυτῶν διὰ πυρὸς παρεχόμενοι. The 
substantive §.=‘‘ means of trial, testing” 
which does not suit this context, or a 
specimen of metal to be tested.— oA v- 
τιμότερον, to justify the common 
rendering (A.V., R.V.) according to which 
a. «.T.A. are taken as in apposition to τὸ 
Sox., dv must be supplied as if omitted by 
haplography after πολ. But there is no 
need for emendation, if πολ. be taken as 
predicate thrown forward for the sake of 
emphasis.— xpvaod «.t.A. St. Peter 
adapts the tamiliar comparison of man’s 
sufiering to the fining-pot of precious 
metal, insisting on the superiority of the 
spiritual to the material gold. The stress 
lies on διὰ πυρός. True faith is tested 
by trials, just as goldis proved by fire. It 
is more valuable than gold which is per- 
ishable. If men test gold thus, much 
more will God test faith which outlives 
the present age, cf. Hebrew ix. 23. Cf. 
use of πύρωσις, iv. 12. 
Zech. xili. 9, δοκιμῶ αὐτοὺς ὡς δοκιμ- 
ἄζεται τὸ χρυσίον; Ps. Ixvi. το; Prov. 
xvil. 3; Sir. ii. 5, ete—Tod d&aoh- 
λυμένου, cf. John vi. 27, τὴ v βρῶσιν 
τὴν ἀπ. (contrasted with imperishable 
food; here gold generally is contrasted with 
faith) and φθαρτοῖς ἀργυρίῳ καὶ χροσίῳ 
Ῥεϊον.---εὑρεθῇ, cf. 2 Peter iii. 14, 
σπουδάσατε ἄσπιλοι kal ἀμώμητοι αὐτῷ 
εὑρεθῆναι ἐν εἰρήνῃ ; Ps. xvii. 3, ἐδοκί- 
paras τὴν καρδίαν pov... καὶ οὐχ 
εὑρέθη ἐν ἐμοὶ ἀδικία.--- εἰς ἔπαινον 
+ - - must be taken with the whole sen- 
tence, unless év be supplied. So eis 
might introduce the predicate (better " 


For the image, ° 


stronger) of evp., cf. Rom. vii. το. εἰς 


taken as = "ἢ expressing transition into 
a new State or condition (as Rom. vii. το). 
--ἔπαινον is theverdict. ‘‘ Well done 
good and faithful servant; enter thou 
into the joy of thy Lord.” The Christian 
is the true Jew and receives at last the 
praise which the name Judah signifies. 
In Rom. ii. 29, 6 ἐν τῷ κρυπτῷ *lovdaios 
- + + οὗ ὁ ἔπαινος οὐκ ἐξ avOpwrev ἀλλ᾽ 
ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ, Paul follows the alteration 
of the original ἐξομολόγησις (Gen. xxix. 
35, LXX, and Philo) consequent upon the 


transference of the praise (=]fyq) from 
God to men (cf. Gen. xlix. 8, Ἰούδα σε 
αἰνέσαισαν ot ἀδελφοί σου). The old 
Israel set their hope on praise from. the 
congregation (Sir. xxxix. 10) or glory 
from men, John v. 44; xii. 42f. The 
new Israel looked for praise from God to 
balance the dispraise of men (Matt. v. 
11 f.); so St. Peter adds ἐπ. to the usual 
formula δόξαν καὶ τιμήν, Rom. ii. 7, Τὸ 
(Ps. viii. 6) δόξῃ καὶ τιμῇ ἐστεφάνωσας 
ἄνθρωπον, cf. σκεῦος εἰς τιμήν, Rom. 
ix. 21, for the less obvious word. 
Hort compares Marcus Aurelius xii. 
II, μὴ ποιεῖν ἅλλο ἢ ὅπερ μέλλει 
ὃ θεὸς ἐπαινεῖν.--ἐν ἀποκαλύψει 
lu. Χυ., when Fesus Christ is revealed. 
The expression is derived from the saying 
κατὰ τὰ αὐτὰ ἔσται ἧ ἡμέρᾳ ὁ vids τοῦ 
ἀνθρώπου ἀποκαλύπτεται (Luke xvii. 30). 
As Judge He will pronounce the verdict 
of approval and bestow glory and honour. 
The reference to present glorified joy in 
the midst of trial suggests that the writer 
has advanced beyond the simple belief in 
a final theophany and contemplates a 
spiritual revelation of Jesus Christ as 
each Christian (cf. Gal. i. 16) realises 
the meaning of His Resurrection; but cf. 
μὴ δρῶντες below. 

Ver. 7. The Christians addressed 
were not personal disciples of Jesus but 
converts of the Apostles (12). As such 
they could claim Beatitude μακάριοι οἱ 
μὴ ἰδόντες Kal πιστεύσαντες (John xx. 
29). Their love began and continues 
without sight of Him; even now when 
they expect His coming they must still 
believe without seeing Him and exult. 
The Latin version of Augustine, gives 


7—I10. 


"δοκιμαζομένου 
ἀποκαλύψει ὃ Χῦ ὃν 
"δρῶντες πιστεύοντες δὲ dyad 
δεδοξασμένη 
ψυχῶν. 
φῆ 


κομιζόμενοι τὸ τέλος 
περὶ ἧς ow 
ται οἱ περὶ τῆς εἰς ὑμᾶς 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 
εὑρεθῆ εἰς ἔπαινον k, 
οὐχ 1 ἰδόντες 3 ἀγαπᾶτε 


λιᾶτε χαρᾶ ἀνεκλαλή 


τηρίας ἐξεζήτησαν κ᾿ 


45 


δόξαν καὶ τειμὴν ev 

εἰς ὃν ἄρτι μὴ 8 
τω καὶ 
τῆς πίστεως σωτηρί avg 
ἐξηραύνησαν προ- 10 


χάριτος mpopyntedca τες 


1 The first hand of Codex Vaticanus is alone in reading οὐχ, which could only 


be justified if followed by an aspirate. 


2For ἰδόντες many manuscripts, headed by Codex Alexandrinus, read εἰδότες : 
‘this confusion between ἰδεῖν and εἰδέναι is common. 


‘three distinct clauses referring to the 
past, the present and the future climax 
whom you knew not; in whom now—not 
secing ye believe; whom when you see you 
will exult. But for lack of support it 
‘must be set aside in favour of the Greek 
text (which regards present as leading 
up to future culmination without a break) 
as being a redaction of the passage for 
separateuse. ets ὃν, with πιστεύοντες, 
μὴ δρῶντες being parenthesis added to 
explain force of πιστ. (Heb. xi. 1 ; Rom. 
vill. 24)—xap@ ἀνεκλαλήτῳ καὶ 
δεδοξασμένῃ. Their faith enables 
them to pass beyond their present suffer- 
ings to the joy which belongs to the sub- 
sequent glories. Thus their joy being 
heavenly is unspeakable and glorified. 
Language cannot express the communion 
with God which the Christian like St. 
Paul may enjoy (2 Cor. xii. 3 f.); com- 
pare Rom. viii. 26, αὐτὸ τὸ πνεῦμα ὑὕπερ- 
EVTVYXGVEL στεναγμοῖς ἀλαλήτοις. And 
this joy is glorified because it is an 
earnest of the glory which shall be re- 
vealed; cf. iv. 14. 

Ver.g. The connexion with mention 
of persecution suggests that the writer is 
here thinking of the saying, in your 
patience ye shall win your souls and per- 
haps also of the contrast between the 
persecutor who has only power over the 
body. Whatever happen to the body 
the conclusion—the consummation of 
their faith—is assured them.—kopvfl6- 
μενοι implies that already they are 
receiving what is due to them (¢f. 
v. 4) and therefore they rejoice with 
Hannah in God the Saviour. In the 
Attic Orators who use a refined form of 
colloquial Greek the verb is common in 
the sense of recovering debts, as in Matt. 
XXV. 27, ἐκομισάμην ἂν τὸ ἐμόν. St. Paul 
applies it to future recompense (2 Cor. v. 
10, ἵνα κομίσηται ἕκαστος τὰ διὰ τοῦ 
“σώματος ; Eph. vi. 8; Col. iii. 25; cf. 2 
Macc. viii. 33, τὸν ἄξιον τῆς δυσσεβείας 


ἐκομίσατο μισθόν) ; in Heb. iii. 4, it is 
used of receiving promises.—T6 τέλος. 
The common meaning fulfilment or con- 
summation gives a fair sense but the con- 
nection with κομιζόμενοι is thus some- 
what strange. The parallel of v. 4, 
taken with Pindar, Ol. x(xi.) 81, Adpv- 
κλος δ᾽ ἔφερε πυγμᾶς τέλος, suggests 
as a possible rendering because ye 
receive the reward. The Septuagint, 
again (Num. xxxi. 28, etc.), uses τ. to 


translate D3%) = proportion to be paid, 
tax. And this use is well estab- 
lished in Greek literature for τὰ τέλη, 
cf. λυσιτελεῖν, etc. Accordingly Suidas 
defines τέλος as TO διδόμενον τοῖς 
βασιλεῦσι. The particular connotations 
can hardly be pressed here but these 
uses give some colour of support to the 
Syriac rendering recompense and the 
mercedem of Augustine; cf. Rom. vi. 22. 
--σωτηρίαν Ψυχῶν = σωτηρίαν 
above. ψυχῶν is added to console the 
readers for their sufferings in accordance 
with Mark viii. 35, ὃς δ᾽ ἂν ἀπολέσει τὴν 
ψυχὴν αὐτοῦ ἕνεκεν τοῦ εὐαγγελίου 
σώσει αὐτήν = John xii. 25; cf. Luke 
xxi. 193 Jas. i. 21. The soul for St. 
Peter is the self or personality as for 
Jesus Himself. 

Vv. 10-12.—The ancient prophets pro- 
phesied concerning the grace which was 
destined for you and enquired diligently 
about this salvation. They were the un- 
conscious instruments of the revelation of 
God and their first duty done continued 
to pore over the inspired descriptions of 
the sufferings and subsequent glories of 
the Messiah. They asked themselves to 
whom does this refer and when shall 
these things be. And to them the revela- 
tion was made that they were only the 
administrators of an estate which others 
—you in fact should enjoy. The subjects 
of their prophecies have now been pro- 
claimed to you by your Christian teachers 
who, like the prophets, were inspired by 


46 


11 ἐραυνῶντες eis 
πνεῦμα } προμαρτυρό 


τίνα ἢ ποῖον καιρὸν 


μενον 3 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ ἃ i 


ἐδήλου τὸ ἐν αὐτοῖς 


τὰ εἰς Χρειστὸ παθήματα καὶ τὰς. 


1 οᾶοχ Vaticanus is alone in omitting Χριστοῦ after πνεῦμα. 
*Codex Alexandrinus with others has προμαρτυρουμενον. 


the Holy Spirit—with this difference that 
now the Spirit has been sent from heaven 
whereas of old He dwelt only in minds 
of a few. And these are the mysteries 
into which angels long to peep. 

St. Peter has utilised a saying of Jesus 
to explain the great problem of unfulfilled 
prophecy and expounded it. Among the 
prophets he includes the so-called apoca- 
lyptic writers like Daniel and his suc- 
cessors. Gradually the coming of the 
Messiah and the dawn of the new age 
had been pushed further and further back 
until the inspired prophets realised that 
—as the Christians held—the Messiah 
would only come just before the end of all. 
The Messiah was not Hezekiah despite 
the Rabbis, nor yet the best of the Has- 
monean houseas Enoch hoped. ἀπεκαλύ- 
φθη. Such was the revelation or Apoca- 
lypse from which the latest of the prophets 
derive their common name; and St. Peter 
credits all the line with the curiosity which 
characterised the last of them and his 
Own contemporaries; cf. Acts ii. and 
Heb. xi. 13 ff. The saying in question 
on which St. Peter builds is reported 
differently: According to Matt. xiii. 17, 
Jesus said, πολλοὶ προφῆται καὶ δίκαιοι 
ἐπεθύμησαν . . . according to Luke x. 24, 
προφῆται καὶ βασιλεῖς ἠθέλησαν. .-. 
according to St. Peter προφῆται (το) καὶ 
ἄγγελοι. The mention of the righteous 
derives support from Heb. xi. 13-16, and 


John viii. 56, and an original OH {p59 
‘“‘the righteous” would easily be altered in 
the course of transmission into 572? 


= princes earthly or heavenly (cf. Dan. 
x. 21; LXX, Μιχαὴλ 6 ἄγγελος). The 
motive which prompted the interpretation 
ἄγγελοι is due to the influence of the 
Book of Enoch (see note beiow) which 
explains the writer’s conception of the 
prophets. 

Ver.1o. The prophets were concerned 
with the Messianic salvation and searched 
their own writings and those of their pre- 
decessors for definite information about 
it. They are honoured by the Christians 
who realise that as a matter of fact they 
prophesied concerning the grace which 
was destined for the Christian Church.— 
τῆς εἰς ὑμᾶς χάριτος, the grace 
which belongs to you, cf. τὰ εἰς χριστὸν 
παθ. (II). 


Ver. 11. The construction of εἰς 


τικιπ. καιρόν and of προμαρτ. is doubt- 
ful. épavv@vres takes up ἐξεζήτησαν 
K.T.A. (10); the run of the sentence seems 
to naturaliy connect τὰ . . . δόξας with 
προμαρτ. and εἰς .. - καιρόν with ἐδή- 
hov. So Vulgate in quod vel quale 
tempus significaret ... Spiritus... prae- 
nuntians., . . passiones. Butifeis.. - 
καιρὸν be unfit to be a direct object and 
προμαρτ., perhaps, to have one of this 
kind, ra... δόξας must be governed 
by ἐδήλου. It is possible also to dis- 
sociate τίνα from καιρὸν and to render 
in reference to whom and what time the 
Spirit signified ...; cf. Eph. v. 22, 
ἐγὼ δὲ λέγω εἰς Χριστόν, Acts ii. 25. If 
τίνα be taken with καιρόν, the two words. 
correspond to the two questions of the 
disciples, When? . . . and what shall be 
the sign ? (Mark xiii. 4). Failing to dis- 
cover at what time, the prophets asked af 
what kind of time; their answer received 
a certain endorsement in the eschatolo- 
gical discourse of Jesus (Mark xiii. 5 ff. 
and parallels).—é€Sy4Aov, cf. Heb, ix. δ, 
τοῦτο δηλοῦντος τοῦ Πνεύματος. The 
word implies discernment on the part of 
the student (Heb. xii. 27, τὸ δὲ ἔτι ἅπαξ 
δηλοῖ... .).. What time .. . did point 
unto of R.V. is unjustifiable; a simple 
accusative is required, 2.¢., either (i.) ποῖον": 
k. or (ii.) τίνα ἢ w. x. (ets being deleted 
as dittography of -es) or (iii) τὰ. 
δϑόξας.--τὸ πνεῦμα Χριστοῦ], the 
full phrase is a natural one for a Christian 
to employ—Christ being here the proper 
name = Jesus Christ and not the title. 
κύριος in the O.T. was commonly inter- 
preted as referring to Our Lord; and 
XC. is a frequent v.J. for KC. Hence 
Barnabas (v.q.), ot προφῆται ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ 
ἔχον τὴν χάριν εἰς αὐτὸν ἐπροφήτευσαν, 
π-προμαρτυρόμενον only occurs 
here. If μαρτύρομαι (the proper sense) 
determine the meaning of the compound 
render ‘‘ protesting (calling God to wit- 
ness) beforehand”. It usage justify con- 
fusion with μαρτυρεῖν, be witness [of | 
render testifying beforehand or (publicly.) 
--τὰ εἰς Xv παθήματα, the doctrine 
that the Messiah must suffer and so enter 
into His glory was stated by the prophets 
(e.g. Isa. iii.) but neglected by the Jews 
of the first century (John xii. 34). Be- 
lievers were reminded of it by the risen 
Lord Himself (Luke xxiv. 26, 46) and put 
it in the forefront of their demonstratio 


II—12. 
pe τὰ ταῦτα δόξας οἷς ἀ 
ὑμῖν δὲ διηκό νουν' αὐτὰ ἃ νῦν avny 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


πεκαλύφθη ὅτι οὐχ ἑ 


47 


αὐτοῖς 12 
γέλη ὑμῖν διὰ τῶν εὖ 


1¥For διηκόνουν Dr. Rendel Harris (Side-Lights on New Testament Research, 
p. 207) conjectures that διενοοῦντο should be read in accordance with the statement 
of the Book of Enoch, “1 contemplated them (the things heard in the vision) not 


for the present generation but for one that was far distant’’. 


See Henoch, i. 2, 


καὶ οὐκ ἐς Tod νῦν γενεὰν διενοούμην ἀλλὰ ἐπὶ πόρρω jvoav ἐγὼ λαλῶ. διανοίας 
of verse 13 is cited in confirmation of the conjecture. 


evangelica (Acts iii. 18, xvii. 3, xxvi. 23). 
The phrase corresponds exactly to the 


original abysyy son: eis standing for 


the - (periphrasis for construct. state).— 
τὰς μετὰ ταῦτα δόξας, the plural 
glories implies some comprehension of the 
later doctrine, ¢.g., John, which recog- 
aised that the glory of Jesus was parti- 
ally manifested during His earthly life; 
although the definition subsequent reflects 
the primitive simplicity and if it be pressed 
the glories must be explained as referring 
to the resurrection ascension triumph over 
angels as well as the glorious session 
(viii. 21 f.).—ofs ἀπεκαλύφθη; so 
St. Peter argues that Joel prophesied the 
last things (cf. Sir. xlviii. 24) and that 
David foresaw and spoke concerning the 
resurrection (Acts ii. 17, 31, ο΄. iii. 24). 
Compare Dan. ix. 2, xii. 4, etc., for ex- 
amples of partial revelations of this kind 
proper to apocalyptic writers. Heb. l.c. 
supy. credits the Patriarchs with the 
same insight—ovx ἑαυτοῖς ὑμῖν 
ὃ έ, negative and positive presentation of 
the past for emphasis is common in this 
Epistle. — S8tunkdvovv αὐτά, ‘they 
were supplying, conveying the revelations 
granted to them—primary the prophecy 
and the revealed solution of it alike,” 
cf. iv. το, εἰς ἑαυτοὺς αὐτὸ διακονοῦν- 
τες. The context shows, if the word 
διακονεῖν does not itself connote it, that 
herein they were stewards of God’s mani- 
fold grace—channels of communication. 
For Acc. with διακον. cf, 2 Cor. iii. 3, 
ἐπιστολὴ Χριστοῦ διακονηθεῖσα ὑφ᾽ 
ἡμῶν, viii. 19, τῇ χάριτι ταύτῃ τῇ δια- 
κονουμένῃ Ud ἡμῶν, from which it may 
be inferred that ὃ. connotes what the 
context here suggests, cf. ἃ viv avny- 
γέλη, have been at the present dispensa- 
tion declared; ἃ. is taken from the great 
proof text relating to the calling of the 
Gentiles, οἷς οὐκ ἀνηγγέλη ἀκούουσιν, 
Isa. lii. 15 cited Rom. xv. 21. ‘‘ But St. 
Peter probably meant more by the word 
. . . the phrase includes not only the 
announcement of the historical facts of 
the Gospel, but, yet more, their implicit 
teachings as to the counsels of God and 


the hopes revealed for men’’ (Hort).— 
διὰ τῶν evayy. tpas, God spake 
through the evangelists (cf. Isa. lxi. 1, 
apud Rom. x. 15) as through the pro- 
phets, Matt. i. 22, ii. 15, etc. Both are 
simply God’s messengers. For accusative 


after evayy. cf. use of QP] = gladden 
with good tidings (Isa. Ixi. 1). So 
πτωχοὶ εὐαγγελίζονται (Matt. xi. 5; 
Luke vii. 22) is substituted for the original 
πτωχοῖς εὐαγγελίζεσθαι (Luke iv, 18 = 
Isa. lxi. 1) if the prophecy which Jesus 
appropriated and which forms the basis 
of the Christian use of the word.— 
πνεύματι «tA. The evangelists 
preached by the Spirit, as Stephen spoke 
(Acts vi. 10), τῷ πνεῦματι ᾧ ἐλάλει. In 
Sir. xlviii. 24, if the Greek and Hebrew 
texts are trustworthy, πνεύματι the 
simple Dative (πνεύματι μεγάλῳ εἶδεν 
τὰ ἔσχατα i.e. Isaiah) corresponds 
to : of. insertion of ἐν here in 
vl. A ἢ descent of the Holy 
Spirit is contrasted with the indwel- 
ling Spirit which inspired the pro- 
phets. The Holy Spirit was given, when 
Jesus was glorified, as never before, οὐκ 
ἐκ μέτρου (John iii. 34). Vulgate renders 
by ablative absolute.—eis &...mapa- 
κύψαι, after expanding the first part of 
Jesus’ saying (and its context ye see) St. 
Peter at last reaches the second in its 
secondary form. He combines with it as 
its proper Scripture, the prophecy of 
Enoch (ix. 1) καὶ ἀκούσαντες οἱ τέσ- 
σαρες μεγάλοι ἀρχάγγελοι . . . παρέ- 
κυψαν ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν ἐκ τῶν ἁγίων τοῦ 
οὐρανοῦ. St. Paul spiritualises the idea 
“to me... this grace was given to 
preach to the Gentiles . . . in order that 
now might be made known to the princi- 
palities and the authorities in heavenly 
places by means of the Church the very- 
varied wisdom of God” (Eph. iii. 8 ff.). 
St. Peter reproduces faithfully the sim- 
plicity of the original and represeits 
this longing as still unsatisfied since the 
Church is not yet perfect or complete. 
It thus becomes part of the sympathetic 
groaning and travailing of the whole 
creation (Rom. viii. 22 f.), In iii. 21 St. 
Peter states on the same authority that 


48 


αγγελισαμένων ὑμᾶς mvedpate! ἁγίω ἀπο 


a 


13 εἰς ἃ ἐπιθυμοῦσιν ay 


τὰς ὀσφύας τῆς διανοίας 


14 ἐπὶ τὴ 


γελοι παρακύψαι. 


φερομένην ὑμῖν χάρι 


TIETPOY A I, 


σταλέντι ἀπ᾽ οὐρανοῦ 
διὸ 


ὑμῶν νέφοντες 3 τε 


dvalwodpevor | 
λείως ἐλπίσατε 


ἐν ἀποκαλύψει 1G Χῦ. ὡς 


1 Τὸ πνεύματι Codex Sinaiticus, with other manuscripts of less weight, prefixes 


ἐν. 
Ξνέφοντες for νήφοντες. 


Christ preached to the spirits in prison ; 
adding that when he ascended all angels 
were subjected to Him. The apparent 
contradiction is due to the discrepancy 
between the ideal and its gradual realisa- 
tion and not to an imperfect coordination 
of these conceptions of the universal 
sovereignty of God. Seer Cor. xv. 25 f., 
feb. 7, not yet do we see... 
παρακύψαι has lost its suggestion of 
peeping through its use in the LXX for 


APw look forth though it is not em- 


ployed by them in the places where God 
15 Said to look down from heaven (Ps. xiv. 
2, εἴς). The patristic commentators 
seem to hold by the Evangelist rather 
than the Apostle in respect to the saying, 
as they refer exclusively for illustration 
to the O.T. figures, Moses (Heb xi. 26), 
Isaiah (John xii. 41). Oecumenius notes 
that Daniel is called by the angel a man 
of longings (Dan. ix. 25). That the 
angels of Peter are due to Enoch and 
secondary seems to be borne out by the 
Targum of Eccles. i. 8, ‘‘ In all the words 
that are prepared (about) to come to pass 
in the world the ancient prophets wearied 


themselves and could not find their 
ends”’. 
Vv. 13-21. Practical admonitions. In 


this section St. Peter is engrossed with 
the conception of the Church as the new 
Israel which has been delivered from 
idolatry—the spiritual Egypt—by a far 
more excellent sacrifice. Jesus Himself 
endorsed such adaptation of the direc- 
tions given for the !typical deliverance 
(Luke xii. 35) and the principle that the 
worshippers of Jehovah must be like 
Him (John iv. 23 f.; Matt. v. 48, etc.). 

Ver. 13. διό introduces the practical 
inference. --ἀναζωσάμενοι, K.TA., 
the reference to the directions for celebra- 
tion of the Passover (Exod. xii. 11, οὕτως 
δὲ φάγεσθε αὐτό- ai ὀσφύες ὑμῶν περι- 
εἵωσμέναι . . . μετὰ σπουδῆς) is unmis- 
takable. The actual deliverance of the 
Christians is still in the future; they 
must be always ready against the coming 
of the Lord. Occ. refers to Job xxxviii, 
3. The particular compound occurs only 
twice in LXX—once in this phrase of the 


manly woman in Prov. xxxi. 17, avaLwoa- 
μένη ἰσχυρῶς THY ὀσφὺν αὐτῆς, where it 
implies preparation for serious work. In 
2 Kings iv. 29 ff. (Elisha’s mission of 
Gehazi which is in some ways a type 
fulfilled by Jesus’ mission of the Seventy, 
cf. Luke x. 4), ζῶσαι τὴν ὀσφύν σου is 
the preparation for an urgent errand. 
The addition of τῆς διανοίας implies that 
the readiness required is spiritual. St. 
Paul uses καρδία in the same way (Eph. 
i. 18, πεφωτισμένους τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς 
τῆς καρδίας ὑμῶν) and from Mark xii. 30 
= Deut. vi. 4 f. it appears that διάνοια is 


a recognised equivalent of 4 heart. 
πτνήφοντες τελείως. Incases like 
this it is natural to take the adverb with 
the preceding verb. τελείως (only 
here in N.T.) has much the same force as 
τῆς διανοίας ; so the adjective is applied 
to the antitype as contrasted with the type 
in Heb. ix. 11, THs... τελειοτέρας 
σκηνῆς and Jas. i. 25, νόμον τέλειον τὸν 
τῆς ἐλευθερίας. For νήφοντες cf. iv. 7 
and ν. 8, νήψατε γρηγορήσατε, τ Thess. 
v. 8, γρηγορῶμεν καὶ νήφωμεν. Sobriety 
is necessary to watchfulness, The origin 
of this use of the word (not in the LXX) 
is to be found in the parable of Luke xii. 
45 f.; it has special point in view of the 
κώμοις and πότοις, in which they were 
prone to indulge.—rtriv φερομένην 
ὑμῖν χάριν is an adaption of the 
common Greek idiom (Homer down- 
wards) φέρειν x., to confer a favour (cf. 
Sir. viii. 19, ph ἀναφερέτω σοι χάριν) 
and is thus analogous to St. Paul’s use 
of χαρίζεσθαι (see Rom. viii. 32). The 
present participle has its natural force. 
Peter does not distinguish between the 
present and the climax; already the new 
age which is the last hasbegun. Thexdpts 
is the final deliverance and its use here 
is another link with the type: ἔδωκεν 6 
Κύριος τὴν χάριν τῷ λαῷ αὐτοῦ (Exod. 
xii, 36ὴ).--ἐν ἀποκαλύψει Ἰησοῦ 
Χριστοῦ, Jesus Christ is being re- 
vealed or is revealing the salvation. The 
revelation began with the resurrection cf. 
φανερωθέντος and continues to the cul- 
mination (7). 

Ver. 14. ὡς, inasmuch as you are, cf. 


13—I7. 

, ς a , 
τέκνα ὑπακοῆς" μὴ συσχηματιζόμε 
τῆ ἀγνοία ὑμῶν ἐπι 
Ὁ aa Ν > Ν Ὁ 3 , 
ἅγιο καὶ αὐτοὶ ἅγιοι ἐν πά 
διότι γέγραπται 
πατέρα ἐπικαλεῖσθε τὸν ἄπρο 


τὸ ἑκάστου ἔργον ἐν φόβω τὸν 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ A 


θυμίαις - ἀλλὰ κατὰ τὸ 
on ἀναστροφῆ γενή 
ὅτι ἅγιοι ἔσεσθε ὅτι ἐ 
σωπολήμπτως κρί 
τῆς παροικίας ὑμῶν 


49 


vat ταῖς πρότερον ἐν 
καλέσαντα ὑμᾶς 15 

Onte - 

γὼ ἅγιος - καὶ εἰ τό, 17 

vovTa κατὰ 


χρόνον 


1 The termination συσχηματιζόμεναι is probably due to the following ταῖς. 


ii. 2, 5, iii. 7, εἴο.--τέκνα ὑπακοῆς, 
obedient corresponds to St. Paul’s υἱοὶ 
τῆς ἀπειθείας (Col. iii, 6; Eph. ii. 2, 
ν. 6). Both phrases reflect the Hebrew 
use of 1.» ‘followed by word of quality 


characteristic, etc.” (B.D.B., s.v., 8). 
For τέκνα in place of usual viot in this 
idiom, cf. Hos. 9, τέκνα ἀδικίας and Eph. 
ii. 3, τέκνα ὀργῆς. Here it suits better 
with βρέφη (ii. τὴ.---συσχηματιΐζό- 
μεναι, from Rom. xii. 2, μὴ συσχημα- 
τίζεσθε τῷ αἰῶνι τούτῳ. The feminine 
is peculiar to B whose scribe was perhaps 
influenced by the Alexandrian identifica- 
tion of woman with the flesh (John i. 13) 
or regarded such conformity as woman- 
ish. The participle has the force of an 
imperative. The Christians needed to 
be warned against conformity to the 
manners and morals of their countrymen, 
which were incompatible with their new 
faith (see v. 2-4). The use of σχῆμα in 
Isa. iii. 17, perhaps assists the use of 
συσχ- in connection with lusts.—év τῇ 
ἀγνοίᾳ ὑμῶν. It wasa Jewish axiom 
that the Gentiles were ignorant (Acts 
xvii. 30; Eph. iv. 17 f.). Christian 
teachers demonstrated the equal ignor- 
ance of the Jews (Peter, Acts iii. 17; 
Paul,in Rom.). So Jesus had pronounced 
even the teachers of Israel to be blind 
and promised them knowledge of the 
truth (John viii. 32 ff., cf. interview with 
Nicodemus); whereas speaking to the 
Samaritan woman He adopted the Jew- 
ish standpoint (John iv. 22)—cf. 2 Kings 
xvii. 29-41 with Isa. ii. 3; Baruch. iv. 4, 
μακάριοί ἐσμεν ᾿Ισραὴλ ὅτι τὰ ἀρεστὰ 
τοῦ θεοῦ ἡμῖν γνωστά ἐστιν. 

Vv. το. The command Ye shall be 
holy for I am holy is connected originally 
with the deliverance from Egypt and the 
distinction between clean and unclean, 
which lays down the principle of separa- 
tion involved in the Exodus (Lev. xi. 44- 
46, etc.; cf. Isa. 111. rz). St. Peter com- 
bines the Scripture with the Word of 
jesus for κατὰ τὸν... corresponds to 
ὡς of Matt. v. 48. Gentiles needed God’s 


summons before they could regard Him 
as their heavenly Father; hence Him 
that called you. Compare Deut. xviii. 
13 (whence τέλειος ot Matt. 1.2.) where 
also contrast with abominations of the 
the heathen.—aytov is better taken as 
predicate than as substantive, since 6 
καλέσας (καλῶν) is well-established as a 
title of God in His relation to Gentile 
Christians (cf. ii. 9, etc.).—év πάσῃ 
ἀναστροφῇ, cf. i. 18, 11. 12, iil. 1, 
2, 16; Tobit iv. 19, ἴσθι πεπαιδευμένος ἐν 
πάσῃ ἀ. σον. The corresponding verb, 
ἀναστρέφεσθαι is found as rendering of 


son in the same sense (Prov. xx. 7, 


ἀναστρέφεται ἄμωμος) ; both verb and 
noun are so used in late Greek authors 
(especially Epictetus).—y ev ἤθη τε be- 
come as you were not OR show yourselves 
as you are; the latter sense suits @. which 
is distinctively outward behaviour. 

Ver. 17, cf. Rom. ii. το, εἰ πατέρα 
ἐπικαλεῖσθε, if ye invoke as Father :— 
reminiscence of Jer. iii. 19, εἰ πατέρα 
ἐπικαλεῖσθέ pe (so Q. perhaps after 
τ Peter, for εἶπα πατέρα καλέσετέ pe) 
cf. Ps. Ixxxix. 27, αὐτὸς ἐπικαλέσεται 
με Πατήρ μου εἶ σύ. There may be a 
reference to the use of the Lord’s Prayer 
(surname the Fudge Father); but the 
context of Jer. 1.6. corresponds closely 
to the thought here: “All the nations 
shall be gathered . . . to Jerusalem, 
neither shall they walk any more after 
the stubbornness of their evil heart. In 
those days . . . Judah and Israel shall 
come together out of the land of cap- 
tivity . . . andI said ‘ My father ye shall 
call me’.” --ἀπροσωπολήμπτως 
summarises St. Peter’s inference from 
experience at Caesarea (Acts x. 34) kata- 
λαμβάνομαι ὅτι οὔκ ἐστιν προσωπολή- 
μπτης ὁ θεός. Adjective and adverb are 
formed from λαμβάνειν πρόσωπον of 


LXX = 1D NWO receive (lift up) the 
face of, i.e., be favourable and later 
partial, to. The degeneration of the 
phrase was due to the natural contras! 


50 


ΤΕ 


18 ἀναστράφη 
ἐλυτρώθητε ἐκ τῆς 
19 δότου " 


between the face and the heart of a man, 
which was stamped on the Greek equiva- 
lent by the use of πρόσωπον for mask of 
the actor or hypocrite—xpivovta. If 
the tense be pressed, compare the saying 
of Jesus recorded in John xii. 31, νῦν 
κρίσις ἐστιν τοῦ κόσμου τούτου. Rom. 
ii. 16 is referred to the last Judgment by 
διὰ Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ. But the present 
participle may be timeless as in ὃ καλῶν, 
ὁ βαπτίζων, etc.—KaTa τὸ Ex άστον 
ἔργον, a commonplace Jewish and 
Christian, cf. Ps. xii. 12 (cited Rom. ii. 6), 
σὺ ἀποδώσεις ἑκάστῳ κατὰ τὰ ἔργα 
αὐτοῦ (Hebrew has the work). R. Aqiba 
used to say . . - The world is judged by 
grace and everything is according to the 
work (Pirge Aboth., iii, 24). For col- 
lective singular lifework, cf. also 1 Cor. 
iii, 13-15, etc.—év φόβῳ, Fear is not 
entirely a technical term in N.T. _Chris- 
tians needed the warning to fear God (so 
Luke xii. 5; 2 Cor. v. 10), although love 
might be proper to the perfect—Gnostic 
or Pharisee—1 John iv. 18. The natural 
and acquired senses exist side by side, as 
appears in the use of ἄφοβος. Compare 
ἄφοβος οὐ Sivarar δικαιωθῆναι (Sir. i. 
(22 with ἐν τούτῳ ἄφοβός εἶμι (Ps. 
xxvii. 2, Symmachus) = in Him I am con- 
fident.—rov τῆς παροικίας Xpo- 
vov, during your earthly pilgrimage, 
which corresponds to the sojourn of 
Israel in Egypt (Acts xiii. 17). If God is 
their Father, heaven must be their home 
(i. 4); their life on earth is therefore a 
sojourn (see on i, x). St. Paul has his 
own use of the metaphor (Eph. ii. 19). 
Gentile Christians are no longer strangers 
and sojourners, but fellow-citizens of the 
saints. 

Ver. 18. Amplification of Isa. lii. 3 f,, 
Δωρεὰν ἐπράθητε καὶ οὐ μετὰ ἀργυρίου 
λυτρωθήσεσϑε (cf. xlv. 13) εἰς 
Αἴγυπτον κατέβη ὁ λαός μου τὸ πρότερον 
παροικῆσαι ἐκεῖ. The deliverance from 
Babylon corresponds to the deliver- 
ance from Egypt. To these the Chris- 
tians added a third and appropriated to it 
the descriptions of its predecessors.—ot 
φθαρτοῖς, «tA. The preceding 
negative relief to positive statement is 
characteristic of St. Peter, who here 
found it in his original (Isa.J.c.). φθαρ- 
τοῖς echoes ἀπολλυμένου and is prob- 
ably an allusion to the Golden Calf of 
which it was said These be thy gods O 


εἰδότες ὅτι οὐ φθαρ 
ματαίας ὑμῶν ἄναστρο 

3 x “ φῳ ε 

ἀλλὰ τιμίῳ αἵματι ὡς 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ .. 


τοῖς ἀργυρίω ἢ χρυσίω 

φῆς πατροπαρα- 
ἀμνοῦ ἀμώμου καὶ ἃ σπίλου 
Israel, which brought thee up out of the 
land of Egypt (Exod. xxxii. 14). Accord- 
ing to Sap. xiv. 8, itis the proper name 
for an idol: τὸ δὲ φθαρτὸν θεὸς ὠνομάσθη. 
So the dative represents the agent and 
not only the instrument of the deliver- 
ance.—patatas supports the view taken 
of Φθ., for the gods of the nations are 


vanity, μάταια bas (Jer. x. 3, etc.).— 
πατροπαραδότου, ancestral, here- 


ditary. The adjective indicates the source 
of the influence, which their old way of 
life—patrius mos, patrii ritus—still exer- 
cised over them. The ancient religion 
had a strength—not merely vis inertiae— 
which often baffled both Jewish δηφ 
Christian missionaries: ‘‘to subvert a 
custom delivered to us from ancestors the 
heathen say is not reasonable” (Clem. 
Ac. Protr. x.). “This power of the dead 
hand is exemplified in the pains taken by 
the Stoics and New Pythagoreans to con- 
serve the popular religion and its myths 
by allegorical interpretation. Among the 
Jews this natural conservatism was highly 
developed; St. Paul was a zealot for the 
ancestral laws. But the combination of 
patriarch and tradition does not prove 
that the persons addressed were Jewish 
Christians. The law, according to which 
the Jews regulated their life, was Divine, 
its mediator Moses; and there is a note 
of depreciation in the words not that it ts 
derived from Moses only from the Fathers 
(John vii. 22). πατρο is contrasted with 
πατέρα (17) as παραδότου with the direct 
calling. 

Ver. 19. The blood of Christ, the true 
paschal lamb, was the (means or) agent 
of your redemption. The type contem- 
plated is composite; the lamb is the 


yearling sheep (ἸῺ πρόβατον, but 
Targum-Onkelos has ΣΝ /amb and 


“Tir? is rendered dpvés in Lev. xii. 8; 
Num. xv. 11; Deut. xiv. 4) prescribed for 
the Passover (Exod. xii. 5). But the des- 
cription perfect (τέλειον pan) is 
glossed by ἀμώμου (cf. Heb. xii. 14), 
which is the common translation of 
DOM in this connection, and ἀσπί- 
Xov which summarises the description 
of sacrificial victims generally (v. Lev. 
xxii. 22, etc.). ἅμωμος would be unintel- 
ligible to the Gentile, because it has 
acquired a peculiar meaning from the 


r8—2I. 


XG προεγνωσ 
Ρωθέντος δὲ ἐπ᾽ ἐσχά 


Hebrew OD blemish. ἄσπιλος is used 
by Symmachus in Job xv. 15, for “Tar 
Hesychius treats ἄσπιλος. ἅμωμος and 
καθαρός as synonyms.—ript@ is set 
over against φθαρτοῖς as πολυτιμ.. against 
ἀπολλυμένου; cf. Ps. cxvi. 15, τίμιος 
ἐναντίον Κυρίου ὁ θάνατος τῶν ὁσίων and 
λίθον . . . ἔντιμον (ii. 4). 

Ver. 20. As the paschal lamb was 
taken on the tenth day of the month 
(Exod. xiii. 3) so Christ was foreknown 
before the creation and existed before 
His manifestation. The preexistence of 
Moses is stated in similar terms in As- 
sumption of Moses, i. 12-14, ‘‘ God created 
the world on behalf of His people. But 
He was not pleased to manifest this pur- 
pose of creation from the foundation of 
the world in order that the Gentiles 
might thereby be convicted... . Ac- 
cordingly He designed and devised me 
and He prepared me before the founda- 
tion of the world that I should be the 
mediator of His Covenant.’’ So of the 
Messiah, Enoch (xlviii. 3, 6) says: ‘‘ His 
name was called before the Lord of 
spirits before the sun and the signs of 
the zodiac were created.... He was 
chosen and hidden with God before the 
world was created. At the end of time 
God will reveal him to the world.” Alex- 
andrian Judaism took over from Greek 
philosophy (Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle) 
the doctrine of the preexistence of all 
souls. Soin the Secrets of Enoch (xxiii. 
5) it is said ‘‘Every soul was created 
eternally before the foundation of the 
world”. The author of Wisdom was a 
goodly child and obtained a good soul or 
vather being good came into a body unde- 
jiled (Sap. viii. 19 f.); and Philo found 
Scriptural warrant in the first of the two 
accounts of Creation (Gen. i. 26 f.). Out- 
side Alexandria, apart from the Essenes 
(Joseph, B. J., ii. 154-157) the general 
doctrine does not appear to have been 
accepted. But the belief in the preexist- 
ence of the Name of the Messiah if not 
the Messiah Himself was not unknown in 
Palestine and was latent in many of the 
current ideals. The doctrine of Trypho 
was probably part of the general reaction 
from the position reached by the Jewish 
thinkers (a.D.) and appropriated by the 
Christians. There are many hints in the 
0.T. which Christians exploited without 
violence and the development of angel- 
ology offered great assistance. Current 


IIETPOY A 


μένου μὲν πρὸ κατα 
του τῶν χρόνων Su 


51 


βολῆς κόσμου φανε 20, 21 


ὑμᾶς τοὺς δι᾿ αὐτοῦ 


conceptions of Angels and Wisdom as 
well as of the Messiah all Jed up to this 
belief. Apart from the express declara- 
tions of Jesus recorded by St. John, it is 
clear that St. Peter held to the real and 
not merely ideal pre-existence of Christ, 
not deriving it from St. Paul or St. John 
and Heb. It is no mere corollary of 
God’s omniscience that the spirit of 
Christ was in the prophets.—q poe- 
γνωσμένου, cf, κατὰ πρόγνωσιν, ver. 
2; only here of Messiah, perhaps as a 
greater Jeremiah (cf. Jer. i. 5)—but see 
the description of Moses cited above.— 
πρὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου. The 
phrase does not occur in LXX but Matt. 


xiii. 35 = Ps. Ixxviii. 2 renders op Ἵ 


by ἀπὸ καταβολῆς (LXX ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς) 
Philo has καταβολὴ γενέσεως and αἱ 
καταβολαὶ σπερμάτων and uses ἐκ K. = 
afresh. In 2 Macc. ii. 29, καταβολή 
is used of the foundation of a house ; cf. 
κατασκευάζειν in Heb.—odavepwOév- 
τος, of the past manifestation of Christ. 
In v. 1 of the future implies previous 
hidden existence, cf. 1 Tim. iii. 16 (quota- 
tion of current quasi-creed) ἐφανερώθη ἐν 
τῷ κόσμῳ. The manifestation consists 
in the resurrection and glorification evi- 
denced by descent of spirit (21): cf. 
Peter’s sermon in Acts ii., risen, exalted, 
Fesus has sent the spirtt: therefore let all 
the house of Israel know surely that God 
hath made Him both Lord and Christ. 
St. Paul speaks in the same way of the 
revelation of the secret, which is Christ 
in you; see especially Col. i. 25-27. 
Compare John i. 14.—€m ἐσχάτου 
τῶν χρόνων, at the end of the times, 
cf. ἐπ᾿ ἐσχάτου τῶν ἡμερῶν (Heb. i. 1 
and LXX). The deliverance effected 
certo tempore by Christ's blood is eter- 
nally efficacious, cf. αἰώνιον λύτρωσιν 
εὑράμενος Heb., ix. 12 and the more 
popular statement of the same idea in 
Apoc. xiii. 8, the lamb slain from the 
foundation of the world. 

Ver. 21. δι’ ὑμᾶς, for the sake of 
you Gentiles, 1.6., ἵνα ὑμᾶς προσαγάγῃ 
τῷ θεῷ, iii. 18. The resurrection of Jesus 
and His glorification are the basis of 
their faith in God and inspire not merely 
faith but hope.—8v αὐτοῦ. Compare 
for form Acts iii. 16, ἡ πίστις ἡ δι᾽ αὐτοῦ 
and for thought Rom. v. 2; Eph. ii. 13— 
πιστοὺς ets θεόν. This construc- 
tion occurs not infrequently in the Bezan 
text and is simply equivalent to π᾿ with 


52 


πιστοὺς 1 εἰς Ov τὸν ἐ 

αὐτῶ 
22 Θ΄ τὰς ψυχὰς 
ας 2 εἰς φιλαδελφίαν 


TIETPOY A 


δόντα ὥστε τὴν wi 
ὑμῶν ἡγνικότες ἐν 
ἀνυπόκριτον " ἐκ καρ 


[.. 

γείραντα αὐτὸν ἐκ ve κρῶν Kal δόξαν 

στιν ὑμῶν καὶ ἐλπίδα εἶναι εἰς. 
πὸ Ὁ my "ἢ ἔχεν ἣν , 

TH ὑπακοῆ τῆς ἀληθεί 

δίας ἀλληλους. 


1 For πιστοὺς Codex Sinaiticus and others substitute the participle πιστεύοντας 
in order to avoid the unfamiliar construction with the adjective. 

2 Manuscripts of secondary importance add διὰ πνεύματος after τῆς ἀληθείας 
and (with the original hand of Codex Sinaiticus) καθαρᾶς before καρδίας. The 
latter addition might be regarded as a mistaken emendation of an accidental repeti- 
tion of καρδίας ; but in the course of transmission such safeguards are commonly 


added to Scriptural texts. 
after καρδίας. 


the Dative (Acts xvi. 15) corresponding 
to ' POR: But π΄. keeping construc- 


tion has changed its meaning. Already 
it is semi-technical = believing, sc. in 
Jesus and here πίστιν .. . εἰς θεόν fol- 
lows immediately. So the verb move- 
ὕοντας is a true gloss; the addition of 
eis θεόν corrects the common conception 
of faith, which ultimately gave rise to a 
distinction between belief in Christ and 
belief in God.—8éEav αὐτῷ δόντα, 
so é.g., the prophecy (Isa. lii. 13) ὁ παῖς 
pov... δοξασθήσεται σφόδρα was ful- 
filled when the lame man was healed by 
St. Peter and St. John; ὃ θεὸς ᾿Αβραὰμ. 
«ον ἐδόξασεν τὸν παῖδα αὐτοῦ ᾿Ιησοῦν 
(Acts iii. 13). But the glory is prim- 
arily and generally the glorious resurrec- 
tion and ascension, in which state Jesus 
sent the Holy Spirit (ἦν τὸ πνεῦμα ὅτι 
οὕπω ἐδοξάσθη, John).—doare ... 
θεόν. καὶ ἐλπίδα may be part of the 
subject of εἶναι eis θεόν, so that your 
faith and hope are in God, or predicate so 
that your faith is also hope in God. In 
either case ἐλπίς is rather confidence 
than hope, in accordance with LXX usage 


(= “ΓΊΏ2), and supplies an adequate 
climax—patient faith leads up to the ap- 


propriation of the Hope of Israel. 

Vv. 22-25. The combination of puri- 
fication of souls with love of the brother- 
hood suggests that the temptations to 
relapses were due to former intimacies 
and relationships which were not over- 
come by the spiritual brotherhood which 
they entered. Different grades of society 
were doubtless represented in all Chris- 
tian churches and those who were marked 
out for leaders by their wealth and posi- 
tion were naturally slow to love the 
slaves and outcasts. As at Corinth old 
intimacies and congenial society led the 
better classes (iv. 3 f.) to fall back on the 
clubs to which they had belonged and in 


The third hand of Codex Sinaiticus substitutes ἀληθινῆς. 


the company of their equals to sneer at 
their new brothers—‘‘ the brethren ” 
(ii. 1). St. Peter reminds them that they 
must purify their souls from the taint— 
with a side-glance perhaps at the rites 
proper to the associations in question. 
They must love the brotherhood and its 
members as such. Earthly relationships 
are done away by their regeneration ; they 
have exchanged the flesh for the spirit. 
The section is full of echoes; compare 
ἡγνικότες with ἅγιοι (15), ἐν ἁγιασμῷ (2), 
τῇ ὑπακοῇ with τέκνα %. (14), avaye- 
γεννημένοι with ἀναγεννήσας (3), φθαρτῆς 
with φθαρτοῖς (18), εὐαγγελισθέν with 
τῶν εὐαγγελισαμένων (12). It should be 
compared throughout with Eph. iv. 18- 
24.—Tas.. . ἡγνικότες from Jer. vi. 16, 
“see what is the good way and walk in 
it and youshall find purification (ayviopev 
LXX) to your souls. ἃ. usually of cere- 
monial purification in LXX. Compare 
Jas. iv. 8, ἁγνίσατε καρδίας δίψυχοι 
(cf. ἀνυπόκριτον). The perfect participle 
is used as indicating the ground of the 
admonition, sO ἀναγεγεννημένοι (23). 
Pagan rites professed to purify the 
worshipper but cannot affect the soul, the 
self or the heart any more than the Jewish 
ceremonies can (Heb. ix. 9 f.). Scripture 
declares 6 φόβος Κυρίου ἁγνός (Ps. xix. 
10). They must realise that they have 
cleansed themselves ideally at baptism, 
of. i John iii. 3 and 15 f. above with con- 
text—év τῇ ὑπακοῇ τῆς ἀληθε- 
tas, in your obedience to the truth, cf. 
Jer. l.c. above. They are no longer igno- 
rant (14) but have learned the truth (cf. 
John xvii. 17-19, and γνώσεσθε τὴν ἀ., 
John viii. 32) from the missionaries. They - 
must persist in the obedience to it which 
they then professed, in contrast with 
those who are disobedient to the truth 
(Rom. ii.8; cf. 2 Thess. ii. 12). Hortsays: 
‘““St. Peter rather means the dependence 
of Christian obedience on the possession 


22—25. 


dyam σατε ἐκτενῶς dvaye 
φθαρτῆς ἀλλὰ 
Tos.” 
ἄνθος 


ἀφθάρτου διὰ λόγου 
διότι πᾶσα σὰρξ 
χόρτου ἐξηράνθη 6 


τὸ δὲ ῥῆμα Ku μένει εἰς τὸν αἰῶ 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 
γεννημένοι οὐκ ἐκ 


ὡς χόρτος καὶ πᾶσα 
, A a ” 
χόρτος καὶ τὸ ἄνθος 


53 


σπορᾶς 23 
ζῶντος Θῦ καὶ pévo 

δόξα αὐτῆς ὡς 24 
ἐξέπεσεν 


να : τοῦτο ὃέ ἐστιν τὸ 


25 


1 The three great uncials (Sinaiticus, Alexandrinus and Ephraemi Rescriptus) put 
φθορᾶς for σπορᾶς keeping φθαρτῆς : the variant was probably a paraphrase of 
the whole phrase and possibly implied the identification of ἀφθάρτου with ζῶντος 


Ocod καὶ μένοντος. 


2 The addition of εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα to μένοντος is due to verse 25. 


of the truth,” relying on Eph, iv. 24, and 
the probability that ‘‘ St. Peter would have 
distinctly used some such language as ἐν 
τῷ ὑπακούειν τῇ ἀληθείᾳ ᾿". In regard to 
the latter point it should be observed that 
St. Peter is curiously fond of using nouns 
instead of verbs (e.g., 2) ets φιλαδε- 
λφίαν, love of the brethren, Vulgate, in 
fraternitalis amore, mutual love which 
exists between brothers. It is the prim- 
ary Christian duty, Matt. xxiii. 8, the 
first fruits of their profession of which St. 
Paul has no need to remind the Thessa- 
lonians, 1 Thess. iv. 9.--ἀνυπόκρι- 
τον, unfeigned, contrasted with the love 
which they professed towards their fellow 
Christians (cf. ii. 1) which was neither 
hearty nor eager. There was pretence 
among them whether due to imperfect 
sympathy of Jew for Gentile or of wealthy 
and honourable Gentiles for those who 
were neither the one nor the other. For 
a vivid illustration of this feigning see 
Jas. ii. 15 f. and ii. 1-5, etc., for the fric- 
tion between rich and ροοι.- -ὠσἹλλήλ- 
ovs ἀγαπήσατε. St. John’s sum- 
mary of the teaching of Jesus (John xiii. 
34 f., xv. 12, 17) which he repeated in 
extreme old age at Ephesus, till the dis- 
ciples were weary of it: ‘‘ Magister quare 
semper hoc loqueris”. His answer was 
worthy of him: ‘‘Quia praeceptum Do- 
mini est et si solum fiat sufficit (Hieron. 
in Gal. vi. 10).—@€xtTev@s, intentius 
(Vulg.), in LXX of ‘strong crying to 
God” (Jonah iii. 8 = ΓΙΡῚ ΤΙΣ violently, 
cf. Jud. iv.12; Joeli.14; 3 Macc. v.g: in 
Polybius of a warm commendation (xxxi. 
22, 12) a warm and friendly welcome (viii. 
21, 1), a warm and magnificent reception 
(xxxili. 16 4). 

Ver. 23. ἀναγεγεννημένοι. So 
St. John ἀγαπῶμεν ἀλλήλους ὅτι... 
πᾶς ὁ ἀγαπῶν ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ γεγέννηται ; 
cf. Eph. iv. 17, v. 2.-πἐκ σπορᾶς 
ἀφθάρτου, i.e, of God regarded as 


VOL. V. 4 


< 

Father and perhaps also as Sower (cf. 
ver. 24); the two conceptions are com- 
binedin σα John iii. 9, was 6 γεγεννημένος 
ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ ἁμαρτίαν ov ποιεῖ ὅτι σπέρμα 
αὐτοῦ μένει. Compare Philo, Leg. All., 
Ρ- 123 M. Λείαν . . . ἐξ οὐδενὸς yevvn- 
τοῦ λαμβάνουσαν τὴν σπορὰν . . . ἀλλ᾽ 
tr’ αὐτοῦ τοῦ θεοῦ.--διὰ λόγου... 
μένοντος, the connection of ζῶντος κ. 
μέν. is doubtful ; the following quotation 
might justify the abiding word and Heb. 
iv. 22, the living word in accordance 
with Deut. xxxii. 47—cf. 3, ἐλπίδα ζῶσαν. 
On the other hand the rendering of the 
Vulgate, per verbum dei vivi et perman- 
entis, is supported by Dan. vi. 26 (αὐτὸς 
yap ἐστιν θεὸς μένων καὶ ζῶν) and sup- 
Ῥοτίβ St. Peter’s argument: earthly rela- 
tionships must perish with all flesh and 
its glory; spiritual kinship abides, be- 
cause it is based on the relation of 
the kinsfolk to God living and abiding. 
For the word of God as the means of 
regeneration, cf. Jas. i. 18, βουληθεὶς 
ἀπεκύησεν ἡμᾶς λόγῳ ἀληθείας. For its 
identification with ῥῆμα of the quotation, 
cf. Acts x. 36 f. 


Ver. 24 f. =Isa. xl. 6-8, adduced as 
endorsement of the comparison instituted 
between natural generation and divine 
regeneration, with gloss explaining the 
saying of Jehovah (cf. Heb. i. 1 f.). The 
only divergences from the LXX (which 
omits—as Jerome notes, perhaps through 
homcedeuton—quia spiritus dei flavit in 
eo: vere foenum est populus; asuit foe- 
num cecidit flos) are that ὡς is inserted 
before x. (so Targum), and that αὐτῆς is 
put for ἄνθρώπου (so Heb., etc.) and 
Κυρίου for τοῦ θεοῦ ἡμῶν (in accordance 
with the proper reading οἵ ¥ehovah in 
the omitted verse). 

Ver.25. τὸ εὐαγγελισ θὲ ν comes 
from 6 εὐαγγελιζόμενος Σειὼν of Isa. χ] 
9 which the Targum explains as referring 
to the prophets. 


54 


II. τ ῥῆμα τὸ εὐαγγελισθὲ" 
κακίαν καὶ 
2 καταλαλιὰς ὡς 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


4 
πάντα δόλον καὶ Ord 


Π. 

εἰς ὑμᾶς. ἀποθέμενοι οὖν πᾶσαν 
κρισιν καὶ φόνους kK πάσας 

ἀρτιγέννητα βρέφη τὸ λογικὸν ἄδολον 


1 φόνους is an error (peculiar to Codex Vaticanus) for φθόνους. 


CuapTer II.—Vv. 1-10. Continuation 
of practical atlmonition with appeal to 
additional ground-principles illustrating 
the thesis of i. ro. 

Ver.1. Put away then all malice—all 
guile and hypocrisy and envy—all back- 
biting. οὖν resumes διό (i. 13). The 
faults to be ®put away fall into three 
groups, divided by the prefix all, and cor- 
respond to the virtues of i. 22 (ὑπόκρισιν 
ἀνυπόκριτον). The special connection 
of the command with the preceding Scrip- 
ture would require the expression of the 
latent idea, that such faults as these are 
inspired by the prejudices of the natural 
man and belong to the fashion of the 
world, which is passing away (i. John ii. 
τη).--ἀδποθέμενοι, putting off. Again 
participle with imperative force. St. Peter 
regards the metaphor of removal as based 
on the idea of washing off filth, cf. cap- 
Kos ἀπόθεσις ῥύπου (ili. 21). St. James 
(1.21, διὸ ἀποθέμενοι πᾶσαν ῥυπα- 
ρίαν καὶ περισσείαν κακία ς) which 
seems to combine these two phrases and 
to deduce the familiarity of the spiritual 
sense of filth (cf. Apoc. xxii. 11, ῥυπαρὸς 
Kaytos). St. Paul has the same word 
but associates it with the putting off of 
clothing (Col. iii. 5 ff.; Eph. iv. 22; Rom. 
xiii. 12—all followed by évdvcac@ar).— 
κακίαν, probably malice rather than 
wickedness. Peter is occupied with their 
mutual relations and considering what 
hinders brotherly love, not their vices, if 
any, as vice is commonly reckoned. So 
James associates the removal of κακία 
with courtesy ; and St. Paul says let all 
bitterness and anger and wrath and 
shouting and ill-speaking be removed 
from you with all malice (Eph. iv. 31; 
cf. Col. iii. 8). κι. is generally eagerness 
to hurt one’s neighbour (Suidas)—the 
feeling which prompts backbitings and 
may be subdivided into guile, hypocrisy, 
and envy.—86hov, Guile was character- 
istic of Jacob, the eponymous hero of the 
Jews, but not part of the true Israelite 
(ἴδε ἀληθῶς Ἰσραηλίτης ἐν ᾧ δόλος οὐκ 
ἔστιν John i. 47). It was also rife 
among the Greeks (μεστοὺς . . . δόλου, 
Rom. i. 29) as the Western world has 
judged from experience (Greek and grec 
= cardsharper ; compare characters of 
Odysseus and Hermes). ὃ. is here con- 


trasted with obedience to the truth (i. 22), 
Vii. 22, ili, το.---πόκρισιν is best ex- 
plained by the saying Isaiah prophesied 
about you hypocrites. ... This people 
honours me with their lips but their heart 
is far away from me (Mark vii. 6f. = Isa. 


xxix. 13). It stands for al profane, 


impure in Symmachus’ version of Ps. 
XxxV. 16; so ὑποκριτὴς in LXX of Job 
(xxxiv. 30, xxxvi. 13), and Aquila (Prov. 
xi. g), etc. In 2 Macc. vi. 25, v is used of 
(unreal ?—not secret) apostasy perhaps 
in accordance with the earlier sense of 


fat which only in post-Biblical Hebrew 
and Aramaic = hypocrisy. In His re- 
peated denunciations of the hypocrites 
Jesus repeated the Pharisees description 
of the Sadducees that live in hypocrisy 
with the saints (Ps. Sol. iv. 7). Polybius 
has ¥. in the classical sense of oratorical 
delivery, and once contrasted with the 
purpose of speakers (xxxv. 2, 13).— 
καταλαλιάς, detractiones (Vulgate), 
of external slanders in ii. 12, 111. 11. For 
internal calumnies, cf. Jas. iv. 11; 2 Cor. 
xii. 20 illustrates one special case, for 
φυσιώσεις κᾳταλαλιαὶ correspond to εἷς 
ὑπὲρ τοῦ ἑνὸς φυσιοῦσθε κατὰ τοῦ 
ἑτέρου of τ Cor. iv. 6 (cf. i. 12). 

Ver. 2. ὡς, inasmuch as you are new- 
born babes; cf. avayeyevvnpevor (i. 23). 
The development of the metaphor rests 
upon the saying, unless ye be turned and 
become as the children (ὡς τὰ παιδία) 
ye shall not enter into the kingdom of 
heaven (Matt. xviii. 3)—Bpéon (only 
here in metaphorical sense) is substituted 
for παιδία (preserved by St. Paul in τ Cor. 
xiv. 20) as= babes at the breast. Α παιδίον 
might have lost its traditional innocence 
but not a βρέφος (= either child unborn 
as Luke i. 41, or suckling in classical 
Greek). For the origin of the metaphor, 
which appears also in the saying of 
R. Jose, ‘‘the proselyte is a child just 
born,” compare Isa. xxvili. 9, Whom 
will he teach knowledge? ... Them 
that are weaned from the milk and 
drawn from the breasts, which the Tar- 
gum renders, To whom was the law 
given? ... Was it not to the house of 
Israel whith ts beloved beyond all peoples ? 
--τὸ ... γάλα. The quotation of 
ver. 3 suggests that the milk is Christ; 


I—5. 


> > 


γά λα ἐπιποθήσατε ἵνα 
εἰ ἐγεύσἄΣα σθε ὅτι χρηστὸς ὃ KS 


“- 


λίθον ζῶντα ὑπ᾽ a 


5 


O@ ἐκλεκτὸν ἔντει prov 


οἶκος πνευματικὸς 


μεῖσθε 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 
ἐν αὐτῷ αὐξηθῆτε 1 εἰς 
θρώπων μὲν ἀποϑε 


καὶ αὐτοὶ ὡς λίθοι 
3 ε o 
εἰς ἱεράτευμα ἅγιον 


55 


σωτηρίαν 3, 4 
πρὸς Ov προσερχόμε νοι 
δὲ 


ζῶντες οἰκοδο- 5 


δοκιμασμένον παρὰ 


ἀνενέγκαι 


1 The variant ἀξιωθῦτε for avéyOrre illustrates the possibilities of variation and 
consequently of emendation: at the same time it directs attention to the omni- 
potence of God and the relative impotence of man. 


compare St. Paul’s explanation of the 
tradition of the Rock which followed the 
Israelites in the desert (1 Cor. x. 4) and 
the living water of John iv. 14. Milk 
is the proper food for babes; compare 
Isa. lv. 1, buy ... milk (LXX, στέαρ) 
without money (cf. i. 18). This milk is 
guileless (cf. δόλον of ver. 1) pure or un- 
adulterated (cf. μνηδὲ δολοῦντες τὸν λόγον 
τοῦ θεοῦ, 2 Cor. iv. 2. The interpreta- 
tion of λογικόν (pertaining to λόγος) is 
doubtful. But the use of λόγος just 
above (i. 23) probably indicates the sense 
which St. Peter put upon the adjective he 
borrowed (?) from Rom, xii. 1, τὴν 
λογικὴν λατρείαν. There and elsewhere 
λ. = rationabilis, spiritual ; here belong- 
ing to contained in the Word of God, 
delivered by prophet or by evangelist. 
St. Paul in his use of \. and of the meta- 
phor of milk (solid food, 1 Cor. iii. x ff.) 
follows Philo and the Stoics.—tva... 
σωτηρίαν, that fed thereon ye may 
grow up (cf. Eph. iv. 14 f.) unto salvation ; 
cf. Jas. i. 21, ‘receive the ingrafted word 
which is able to save your souls’”’. 

Ver. 3. St. Peter adopts the language 
’ of Ps. xxxiv. 9, omitting καὶ ἔδετε as inap- 
propriate to γάλα. χρηστός (identical in 
sound with χριστός) = dulcis (Vulg.) or 
kind (cf. χρηστότης θεοῦ, Rom. ii. 4, xi. 
22). Compare Heb. vi. 4 f. yevoapévous 
τῆς δωρεᾶς τῆς ἐπουρανίου... καὶ 
καλὸν γευσαμένους θεοῦ ῥῆμα. 

Vv. 4-το. 
ing that Christ is called stone are first 
utilised, then quoted, and finally ex- 
pounded. The transition from milk to 
the stone may be explained by the pro- 
phecy the hills shall flow with milk (Joel 
iii. 18), as the stone becomes a mountain 
according to Dan. iii. 21 f.; or by the 
legend to which St. Paul refers (1 Cor. x. 
4); compare also ποτίσαι of Isa. xliii. 20, 
which is used in ver. 9. This collection 
of texts can be traced back through Rom. 
ix. 32 f. to its origin in the saying of 
Mark xii. to f.; Cyprian (Test. ii. 16 f.) 
gives a still richer form. 

Ver. 4. πρὸς ὃν προσερχ- from 


Passages of scripture prov-— 


Ps. xxxiv. 6, προσελθόντες πρὸς αὐτὸν 
(Heb. and Targum, they looked unto 
Him ; Syriac, look ye ...). Cyprian 
uses Isa. ii. 2 f.; Ps. xxiii. 3 f. to prove 
that the stone becomes a mountain to 
which the Gentiles come and the just 
ascend.—AlOov ζῶντα, a paradox 
which has no obvious precedent in O.T. 
Gen. xlix. 24 speaks of the Shepherd the 
stone of Israel, but Onkelos and LXX 


substitute TaN thy father for jas 


stone. The Targum of Isa. viii. 14, how- 
ever, has ΓΤ jas a striking stone, for 


FAI which might be taken as meaning 


veviving or living stone, if connected 
with the foregoing instead of the follow- 
ing words. The LXX supports this con- 
nection and secures a good sense by in- 
serting a negative; the Targum gives 
a bad sense throughout. wm... 
ἔντιμον, though by men rejected, yet 
in God’s sight elect precious. ἀποϑεδοκ. 
comes from Ps. cxviii. 22 (see ver. 7); 
ἐκλ. ἐντ. from Isa. xxviii. 6 (see ver. 6). 
ἀνθρώπων is probably due to Rabbinic 


exegesis “read not D9} builders but 


DIN I sonsofmen”. St. Peter insists 
upon the contrast between God’s judg- 
ment and man’s in the sermon of Acts ii. 

Ver. 5. Fulfilment of the saying, 
Destroy this temple and in three days 
I will raise it (John 11. 19). Christians 
live to God through Jesus Christ (Rom. 
vi. 11). For this development of the 
figure of ee cf. especially Eph. ii. 
20 ff.—oikodopetaOe, indicative 
rather than imperative. ‘‘ It isremarkable 
that St. Peter habitually uses the aorist 
for his imperatives, even when we might 
expect the present; the only exceptions 
(two or three) are preceded by words re- 
moving all ambiguity, ii. 11, 17, iv. 12 f.” 
(Hort).—otkos ...a@ytov, aspiritual 
house for an holy priesthood. The con- 
nection with priesthood (Heb. x. 21) and 
the offering of sacrifices points to the 
special sense of the House of God, 1.e., 


6 πνευματι 
περιέχει ἐν γραφῆ 
ἀκρο γωνιαῖον ἔντειμον 

7 καταισχυν 
στοῦσιν! δὲ λίθος ὃν a 
ἐ γγενήθη εἷς κεφαλὴν 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


κὰς θυσίας εὐπροσδέ 
ἰδοὺ τίθημι ἐν Σειὼν 


θῆ - ὑμῖν οὖν ἡ τειμὴ 
πεδοκίμασαν ot οἰκο 

, . ’ 
γωνίας καὶ λίθος προσ 


Τίς 
κτους O& διὰ 1d XG de ότι 
λίθον ἐκλεκτὸν 

Noe , aN - a > x 
καὶ 6 πιστεύων ἐπ᾿ αὖ τῶ οὐ μὴ 
τοῖς πιστεύουσιν - ἄπι 
δομοῦντες οὗτος 

4A 
κόμματος καὶ 


1 For ἀπιστοῦσιν Codex Alexandrinus, with others, reads ἀπειθοῦσιν. 


the Temple; "ἰοῦ. (iv. 17; 1 Tim. iii. 5) 
ναὸς ὅς ἐστε ὑμεῖς, τ Cor. iii. 16; Eph. 
ii. 21. So Heb. iii. 5 f., οὗ (Χριστοῦ) 
οἶκός ἐσμεν ἡμεῖς. . —lepatevpa, 
body of priests, in Exod. xix. 6 (Heb. 
priests) xxiii. 22; 2 Macc. ii. 17; cf. 9 
infra. Here Hort prefers the equally legi- 
timate sense, act of priesthood. Usage 
supports the first and only possible ety- 
mology the second. The ideal of a 
national priesthood is realised, Isa. 1xi. 6. 
—dvevéyxat... Χριστοῦ. to 
offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to 
God through Fesus Christ—8r.a*lynood 
X. is better taken with av. than εὐπροσδ.; 
cf. Heb. xiii. 15, δι᾽ αὐτοῦ, where the 
thankoffering is singled out as the fit 
type of the Christian sacrifice. Spiritual 
sacrifices are in their nature acceptable to 
God (John iv. 23) and Christians are en- 
abled to offer them through Jesus Christ. 
ἀναφέρειν in this sense is peculiar to 
LXX, Jas. and Heb. 

Ver. 6. περιέχει ἐν γραφῇ, it 
is contained in Scripture. The formula 
occurs in Josephus (Ant. xi. 7, βούλομαι 
γενέσθαι πάντα καθὼς ἐν [τῇ ἐπιστολῇ] 
περιέχει) and is chosen for its compre- 
4ensiveness.—m epué yeu is intransitive 
as the simple verb and other compounds 
often are; cf. περιοχή, contents, Acts viii. 
32.—y pad ῇ, being a technical term, has 
no article—iSo0v...kaTatoxvv07q, 
formal quotation of Isa. xxviii. 16, preced- 
ing quotation from Psalms, as prophets 
always precede the writings. The LXX 
has ἰδοὺ ἐμβάλλω ἐγὼ eis τὰ θεμέλια 
(unique expansion of normal θεμελιῶ = 
ID" of Heb., cf. eis τὰ 8. below ; Targum, 


SSD I will appoint) Σειὼν λίθον wodv- 
τελῆ (a. duplicate of ἔντιμον ; Heb., a 
stone a stone; Targum, a king a king ; 
pointing to Jewish Messianic interpreta- 
tion) ἐκλεκτὸν ἀκρ. ἔντ. εἰς τὰ θεμέλια 
αὐτῆς (a foundation a foundation, Heb.} 
καὶ ὁ πιστεύων (+ ἐπ᾽ αὐτῷ SHAQ) οὐ μὴ 
καταισχυνθῇ (= ἩΔῪ for warp of 
Heb. = shall not make haste; Targum, 
when tribulation come shall not be moved). 


The chief difference is that St. Peter 
omits all reference to the foundation, 
and substitutes τίθημι; LXX is conflate, 
ἐμβάλλω eis being the original reading 
and τὰ θεμ. added by some purist to pre- 
serve the meaning of the Hebrew root. 
This omission may be due to the fact that 
Christians emphasised the idea that the 
stone was a corner stone binding the two 
wings of the Church together (Eph. ii. 20) 
and regarded this as inconsistent with 
eis κεφ. 

Ver. 7 f. Thesecond quotation is con- 
nected with the first by means of the 
parenthetic interpretation: The “ pre- 
cious ”-ness of the stone is for you who. 
believe but for the unbelievers it is... 
‘a stone of stumbling”. Itis a stereo- 
typed conflation of Ps. cxviii. 22 and Isa. 
viii. 14, which are so firmly cemented 
together that the whole is cited here 
where only the latter part is in point. 
The same idea of the-two-fold aspect of 
Christ occurs in St. Paul more than 
once; ¢g., Christ crucified to Fews a 
stumbling-block . . . but to you who be- 
lieve . . . 1 Cor.i. 23. The problem in- 
volved is discussed by Origen who ad- 
duces the different effects of the sun’s 
light— τιμή, the τιμή involved in the 
use of the adjective ἔντιμον., or rather 


Heb. mp underlying it. The play 


on the peculiar sense thus required does 
not exclude the ordinary meaning honour 
(for which cf. i. 7; Rom. ii. το).---λίθος 
dv... γωνίας = Ps. lc. (LXX)—the 
prophetic statement in scriptural phrase 
of the fact of their unbelief. The idea 
may be that the raising of the stone to be 
head of the corner makes it a stumbling- 
block but in any case λίθος. . . σκα- 
νδάλου is needed to explain this.—A lBo¢ 
προσκόμματος k. π΄. ox. from Isa. 
viii. 14 ; LXX paraphrases the original, 
which St. Peter’s manual preserves,. 
reading καὶ οὐχ ὡς λίθῳ προσκόμματι 
συναντήσεσθε οὐδὲ ὡς πετρας πτώμ- 
ατι (common confusion of construct. with 
Gen.).— ot... ἀπειθοῦντες, des- 


6—9. TIETPOY A 57 
πέτρα σκανδάλου οὗ προσκό πτουσιν τῶ λόγω ἀπι στοῦντες 8 
εἰς ὃ καὶ ἐξέ θησαν "1 ὑμεῖς δὲ γένος ἐκλεκτὸν βασίλειον 9 


ε , » oe - 
ἱεράτευμα ἔθνος ἅγιο 


ἐξαγ γείλητε τοῦ ἐκ σκότους 


λαὸς εἰς περιποίησιν " 
ὑμᾶς καλέσαντος εἰς 


ὅπως τὰς ἀρετὰς 
τὸ 


1In view of “the argument which is intended to carry one back to the opening 
of the prophetic passage,’ Dr. Rendel Harris (Side-Lights on New Testament 
Research, pp. 209 f.) proposes to substitute ἐτέθη for ἐτέθησαν. 


cription of the unbelieving in terms of 
the last quotation, who stumble at the 
word being disobedient. τῷ λόγῳ is pro- 
bably to be taken with mp. or both mp. 
and a. in spite of the stone being identi- 
fied with the Lord. Stumbling at the 
word is an expression used by Jesus 
(Mark iv. 17, διὰ τὸν λόγον σκανδαλί- 
ἵονται; Matt. xv. 12, ἀκούσαντες τὸν 
λόγον ἐσκανδαλίσθησαν ; John vi. 60, 
τοῦτο--ὁ λόγος οὗτος-- ὑμᾶς σκανδα- 
λίζε). For ἀ. οἴ iv. 17, τῶν ἀπειθούντων 
τῷ τοῦ θεοῦ εὐαγγελίῳ.--εἰς ὃ καὶ 
ἐτέθησαν, whereunto also (actually) 
they were appointed. ἐτέθησαν comes 
from τίθημι (6); stone and stumbler 
alike were appointed by God to fulfil 
their functions in His Purpose. For the 
sake of the unlearned he only implies and 
does not assert in so many words that 
God appointed them to stumble and 
disobey; but his view is that of St. Paul 
(see Rom. ix., xi., especially ix. 17, 22); 
cf. Luke ii. 34. Didymus distinguishes 
between their voluntary unbelief and 
their appointed fall. If any are tempted 
to adopt such ingenious evasions of 
the plain sense it is well to recall the 
words of Origen: ‘‘If in the reading of 
scripture you stumble at what is really a 
noble thought, the stone of stumbling 
and rock of offence, blame yourself. You 
must not despair of this stone . . . con- 
taining hidden thoughts so that the say- 
ing may come to pass, And the believer 
shall not be shamed. Believe first of all 
and you will find beneath this reputed 
stumbling-block much holy profit (in Jer. 
xliv. (li.) 22, Hom. xxxix. = Philocalia x.). 

Vy.gf. The Church, God’s new people, 
has all the privileges which belonged to 
the Jews. In enumerating them he draws 
upon a current conflation of Isa. xliii. 
20 f., ποτίσαι τὸ γένος pov το ἐκλεκτὸν 
(1) λαόν μου ὃν περιεποιησάμην (4) τὰς 
ἀρετάς μου διηγεῖσθαι with Exod. xix. 
65, ὑμεῖς δὲ ἔσεσθέ μοι βασίλειον ἱερά- 
τευμα (2) καὶ ἔθνος ἅγιον (3) ἔσεσθέ μοι 
αὸς περιούσιος (4) ἀπὸ πάντων τῶν 
ἐθνῶν (1); and Ps. cvii. 14, καὶ ἐξήγαγεν 
αὐτοὺς καὶ ἐκ σκιᾶς θανάτου . . . ἐξομο- 


λογησάσθων τῷ κυρίῳ τὰ ἐλέη αὐτοῦ καὶ 
τὰ θαυμάσια αὐτοῦ τοῖς υἱοῖς τῶν ἄνθ- 
ρώπων---ἰο which is appended Hos. i. 
6, 8.—yévos ἐκλεκτόν, Isa. lic, LXX 
(Heb., my people my chosen); γένος, race 
implies that all the individual members 
of it have a common Father (God) and 
are therefore brethren (cf. viol γένους 
‘ABpadp, Acts xiii. 26); cf i. τ, 6.— 
βασίλειον ἱεράτευμα, a royal 
priesthood, from Exod. l.c. LXX (Heb., a 
kingdom of priests = Apoc. i. 6, βασιλείαν 
iepets). Christians share Christ’s prero- 
gatives. The priesthood is the chief point 
(see ii. 5) it is royal. Clement of Alex- 
andria says: ‘“‘Since we have been sum- 
moned to the kingdom and are anointed 
(sc. as Kings)”. The comparison of Mel- 
chizedek with Christ perhaps underlies 
the appropriation of the title—é6vos 
ἅγιον, to the Jew familiar, with the use 
of ἔθνη for Gentiles, as much a paradox 
as Christ crucified. But λαός, the com- 


mon rendering of OY in this connexion 
is wanted below, and St. Peter is content 
to follow his authority.—Aads εἰς 
περιποίησιν, a people for possession 


= πἰϑὴὸ o The source of the Greek 
phrase is Mal. iii. 17, but the Hebrew 
title variously rendered occurs in the two 
great passages drawn upon. Deut. (vii. 
6, etc.) has λαὸς περιούσιος which is 
adopted by St. Paul (Tit. ii. 14); but the 
phrase eis π. is well established in the 
Christian vocabulary, Heb. x. 39 ; 1 Thess. 
v. 9; 2 Thess. ii. 14, and the whole title 
is apparently abbreviated to περιποίησις 
in Eph. i. 14.—8tTos... ἐξαγγε- 
ἔλη τε, from Isa.l.c. + Ps. l.c., the latter 
containing the matter of the following 
designation ot God. In Isa. tas ape- 


τάς pov stands for snoan my praise; 
and this sense reappears in Esther xiv. 
το. ἀνοῖξαι στόμα ἐθνῶν εἰς ἀρετάς 
ματαίων, the praises of idols. Else- 
where it stands for “J\fq» glory (Hab. 
ili. 3; Zach. vi. 43). In the books of 
Maccabees (especially the fourth) it has 
its ordinary sense of virtue, which cannot 


10 θαυμαστὸν αὐτοῦ 
11 οὐκ ἢ 
ὡς παροίκους 
12 ἐπιθυμιῶν αἵτινες 

στροφὴν 2 ὑμῶν ἐν τοῖς 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ A 


φῶς - οἱ ποτὲ οὐ λαὸς 
λεημένοι νῦν δὲ ἐλε 
καὶ παρεπιδήμους ἀπέ 
στρατεύονται κατὰ 
μι ‘ o 
ἔθνεσιν καλὴν ἵνα 


Il. 
viv δὲ λαὸς OD οἱ 
ἀγαπητοὶ παρακαλῶ 
χεσθαι : τῶν σαρκικῶ᾽ 
τῆς ψυχῆς τὴν ἀνα 
ἐν ὦ καταλαλοῦσιν 


ηθέντες. 


1For ἀπέχεσθαι Codex Alexandrinus and others read ἀπέχεσθε: ε and at are 


interchangeable in the manuscripts. 


2 Codex Vaticanus omits ἔχοντες, which is formally required to govern ἄναστρο- 


φὴν. 


be excluded altogether here. The whole 
clause is in fact the pivot on which the 
Epistle turns. Hitherto Peter has ad- 
dressed himself to the Christians and 
their mutual relations, now he turns to 
consider their relations to the outside 
world (i. τα ἢ). In 2 Peter i. 3, ἃ. corre- 
sponds to θεία δύναμις, a sense which 
might be supported by Ps. l.c. (for dis- 
cussion of other—very uncertain — evi- 
dence see Deissmann, Bible Studies, pp. 
95 ff., 362) and the events of Pentecost 
(see especially Acts ii, II)—rot... 
φῶς is derived from Ps. /.c.; the natural 
antithesis light is readily supplied (cf. 
Eph. v. 8, 14) ; darkness = heathenism in 
cf. το. Γ 

Ver. 10, from Hosea i. 6, ii. 1(3); cf. 
Rom. ix. 25 (has καλέσω κάλεσον of 
Hos.); the terms are so familiar that 
μου 15 omitted by Peter as unnecessary 
(cf. γένος éx. for τὸ y. pov é.). 

Vv. 11 f. indicate generally the subject 
to be discussed. Beloved I exhort you 
to abstain from the lusts of the flesh, be- 
cause they wage war against the soul. 
Slanders and even torments can only 
affect the body. But the lusts natural 
or acquired which you have renounced 
may hinder your salvation, as they have 
already impeded your mutual love. For 
the sake of your old friends and kinsfolk 
refuse to yield to their solicitations. If 
rebuffed they resort to persecution of 
whatever kind, remember that it is only a 
passing episode of your brief exile. Let 
your conduct give them no excuse for 
reproach; so may they recognise God’s 
power manifest not on your lips but in 
your lives—ayamn τοί, not an empty 
tormulze but explanation of the writer’s 
motive. He set before them the great 
commandment and now adds to it as 
Jesus did, Love one another as I have 
loved you, John xiii. 34.—@s π. καὶ 
παρεπιδήμους with amex. (motive 
for abstinence in emphatic position) rather 
than παρακαλῶ (as νουθετεῖτε ὡς ἀδελφόν, 
2 Thess. iii. 15—the motive of exhorta- 


If ἀπέχεσθαι represents the infinitive, ἔχοντας would be more grammatical. 


tion is here expressed by ay.) echoes 
παρεπιδήμοις of i. τ and παροικίας of 
i.17. The combination (= 39) Δ) 
occurs twice in LXX (Gen. xxxiil. 4; Ps. 
xxxix. 13). Christians are in the world, 
not of the world.—améxeo@at, cf. 
Plato, Phaedo, 82 C, true philosophers, 
ἀπέχονται τῶν κατὰ TO σῶμα ἐπιθυμιῶν 
ἁπάσων---ποί for fear of poverty, like the 
vulgar, nor for fear of disgrace, like the 
ambitious, but because only so can he, 
departing in perfect purity, come to the 
company of the gods”.—Tt@v capkt- 
κῶν ἐπιθυμιῶν, the lusts of the flesh. 
St. Peter borrows St. Paul’s phrase, ἡμεῖς 
πάντες ἀνεστράφημέν ποτε ἐν ταῖς ἐπι- 
θυμίαις τῆς σαρκὸς ἡμῶν ποιοῦντες τὰ 
θελήματα τῆς σαρκὸς καὶ τῶν διανοιῶν 
(Eph. ii. 3), but uses it in his own way 
in a sense as wide as Tas κοσμικὰς é. 
(Tit. ii. 12). For the flesh is the earthly 
life (cf. Col. iii. 5) the transitory mode of 
existence of the soul which is by such 
abstinence to be preserved (i. 9).— 
αἵτινες ... Ψυχῆς, because they 
are campaigning against the soul. — 
στρατεύονται (cf. iv. rf., for mili- 
tary metaphor) perhaps derived from Rom. 
vii. 23, “1 perceive a different law in my 
members warring against (ἀντιστρατε- 
υηόμενον) the law of my mind;” cf. Jas. 
iv. 1, the pleasures which war in your 
members, and 4 Macc. ix. 23, ἱερὰν καὶ 
εὐγενῆ στρατείαν στρατεύσασθε περὶ τῆς 
εὐσεβείας.-κατὰ τῆς Ψυχῆς. The 
lusts of this earthly life are the real 
enemy for they affect the soul. Compare 
Matt. x. 28, which may refer to the Devil 
and not to God, and the Pauline parallel, 
ἡ σὰρξ ἐπιθυμεῖ κατὰ τοῦ πνεύματος 
. +. ταῦτα γὰρ ἀλλήλοις ἀντικεῖται 
(Gal. v. 17). 

Ver. 12. Adaptation of the saying, 
ὅπως ἴδωσιν ὑμῶν τὰ καλὰ ἔργα καὶ 
δοξάσωσιν τὸν πατέρα ὑμῶν τὸν ἐν τοῖς 
οὐρανοῖς (Matt. ν. 16). The good be- 
haviour on which the resolved ἀναστρέ- 
φεσθαι permits stress to be laid is the 


Io—I5. 


6 μῶν ὡς κακοποιῶν 


δοξά σωσι τὸν OV ἐν ἡμέρα 
, " , 
πάση ἀνθρωπί νη κτίσει 
ὕπε ρέχοντι εἴτε ἡγεμό 
ἐκδίκη σιν κακοποιῶν ἔπαι 
ἐστὶν τὸ θέλημα τοῦ OT ἀγαθο 


fruit of the abstinence of ver. 11; cf. 
Heb. xiii. 8; Jas. iii. 13. This second 
admonition is disjointed formally—against 
formal grammar—from the first; cf. Eph. 
iv. If., παρακαλῶ. .. ὑμᾶς ... ἄνε- 
χόμενοι.--ἐντοῖς ἔθνεσιν, the people 
of God (ii. 9) is a correlative term and 
implies the existence of the nations, who 
are ignorant and disobedient. The situa- 
tion of the Churches addressed justifies 
the use of Dispersion ini. 1. But the point 
of the words here is this: you—the new 
Israel must succeed where the old failed, 
as it is written my name is blasphemed 
ἐν τοῖς ἔθνεσιν on your account (88. lii. 
5; LXX, cited Rom. ii. 24)—tva... 
ἐπισκοπῆς, in order that as a result 
of your good works they may be inttiated 
into your secrets and come to glorify God 
_in respect to your conduct when He at last 
visits the world, though now they calum- 
niate you as evildoers in this matter.— 
ἐν ᾧ in the case of the thing in which, 
z.e., your behaviour generally ; cf. 111. 16, 
iv. 4, and for δοξ. τὸν θεὸν ἐν, iv. 11, 16. 
π-καταλαλοῦσιν ὡς x. Particular 
accusations are given in iv. 15. This 
popular estimate of Christians is reflected 
in Suetonius’ statement: Adflicti suppli- 
ciis Christiani, genus hominium super- 
stitionis novae et maleficae (Ner. 16).— 
ἐποπτεύοντες takes Acc. in iii. 2 (over- 
look, behold, as in Symmachus’ version of 
Ps, x. 14, xxxili. 13); but here the avail- 
abie objects are either appropriated (θεόν 
with 808.) or far off (ἀναστροφήν). It will 
therefore have its ordinary sense of become 
ἐπόπτης, be initiated. The Chris- 
tians were from the point of view of their 
former friends members of a secret asso- 
ciation, initiates of a new mystery, the 
secrecy of which gave rise to slanders 
such as later Christians brought against 
the older mysteries and the Jews. St. 
Peter hopes that, if the behaviour of 
Christians corresponds to their profession, 
their neighbours will become initiated into 
their open secrets (for as St. Paul insists 
this hidden mystery has now been τε- 
vealed and published)—8o0fdawotv 
τὸν θεόν, come to glorify God—like 
the centurion, who said of the crucified 
Jesus, Truly this was the Son of God 


TIETPOY A 


ἐκ τῶν καλῶν ἔργων 
ἐπισκοπῆς. 
διὰ τὸν KV 
ς 3 > a 
ow ὡς Sv αὐτοῦ πεμ 
νον δὲ ἀγαθοποιῶν - 


59 


ἐποπτεύοντες 


Ὑητε 13 
βασιλεῖ ὡς 


ὑὕποτά 
εἴτε 
πομένοις εἰς 14 

ὅτι οὕτως 15 
ποιοῦντας φειμοῦ τὴν 
(Mark xv. 39)—i.e., recognise the finger 
of God either in the behaviour of the 
Christians or in the whole economy (see 
Rom. xi.).—év ἡμέρᾳ ἐπισκοπῆς, 
from Isa. x. 3, What will ye do—ye the 
oppressors of the poor of my people—in 


day of visitation (Fqpp Di) i.e, (Tar- 


gum), when your sins are visited upon 
you. But St. Peter looks for the repent- 
ance of the heathen at the last visitation 
(cf. iv. 6), though the prophet found no 
escape for his own contemporaries. Com- 
pare Luke xix. 44. 

Vy. 13-17. The duty of the Christian 
towards the State; compare Rom. xiii. 
1-.--πάσῃ ἀνθρωπίνῃ κτίσει, 
every human institution, including rulers 
(14), masters (18), and husbands (ili. 1). 
κτίζειν is used ordinarily in many senses, 
é.g., of peopling a country, of founding a 
city, of setting up games, feasts, altar, 
etc. In Biblical Greek and its descend- 
ants it is appropriated to creation. Here 
κτίσις is apparently selected as the most 
comprehensive word available; and the 
acquired connotation—creation by God— 
is ruled out by the adjective ἀνθρωπίνῃ. 
It thus refers to all human institutions 
which man set up with the object of 
maintaining the world which God created. 
--“διὰ τὸν κύριον, for the sake of the 
Lord. διά may be (τ) retrospective— 
i.e., because Jesus said, Render what is 
Cesar’s to Cesar or, generally, because 
God is the source of all duly-constituted 
authority; or (ii.) prospective for the sake 
of Fesus (Fehovah); your loyalty re- 
dounding to the credit of your Master in 
heaven.—Baogthei, the Roman Em- 
peror, as in Apoc. xvii. 9, etc.; Josephus 
Biles νυν πθ; Ὁ: Ἰηγγα.- -ὡπερέχοντι, 
pre-eminent, supreme, absolute, as in Sap. 
vi. 5, where τοῖς ὑπερέχουσιν Corresponds 
to those who are underlings of His Sove- 
reignty (4), to whom power was given 
from the Lord (3); cf. δι᾽ αὐτοῦ below.— 
ἡγεμόσιν, properly Governors of pro- 
vinces, but Plutarch uses the singular = 
Imperator. Peter rather follows the con- 
ventional rendering of the saying of Jesus, 
ἐπὶ ἡγεμόνων Kal βασιλέων σταθήσεσθε, 
interpreted in the light ot popular usage 


60 


16 τῶν ἀφρόνων 
ὡς ἐπικάλυμμα ἔχο᾽ 
17 Θῦ δοῦλοι πάντας τιμή 
18 τὸν OF φο 
τασσόμενοι ἐν παντὶ 
Ig ἀγαθοῖς 


(cf. Luke xxi. 12) or of Jet. xxxix. 3, ἥγε- 
poves βασιλέως Βαβυλῶνος. Contrast 
vague general term, ἐξουσίαις ὕπερεχ ὡς 
. » « which St. Paul employed before his 
visit to Rome.—wepm., as being sent 
through the Emperor. διά implies that 
the governors are sent by God acting 
through the Emperor; so Rom. xiii. 1-7 
(cf. Sap. vi. 3) and John xix. 11, et μὴ ἦν 
εδομένον σοι avwlev.—eis ἐκδίκησιν, 
κιτιλ. The ruler executes God’s ven- 
geance (Rom. xii. 19) and voices God’s 
approval (Ps. xxii. 25, παρὰ σοῦ 6 ἔπαινός 
ov). The former function of governors 
has naturally become prominent, the latter 
is exemplified in the crowns, decrees and 
panegyrics with which the Greek and 
Jewish States rewarded their benefactors 
if not mere well-doers—ottTws... 
since this is so (referring to 13 f.) God's 
will is that ... (cf. Matt. xviii. 14, 
οὕτως οὐκ ἔστιν θέλημα where οὕτως 
refers to the preceding parable) rather 
than God’s will is thus namely that 
. or... well-doing thus. Since 
God has set up governors who express 
His approval of well-doers, you as well- 
doers will receive official praise and thus 
be enabled to silence the slanderers. 
St. Peter is thinking of the verdict pro- 
nounced in the case of St. Paul and of 
Jesus himself—?tpodty, (1) muzzle (τ 
Cor. ix. 9), (2) sélence as Jesus did (Matt. 
xxii. 34, ἐφίμωσεν τοὺς Σαδδουκαίους). 
--τὴν ἀγνωσίαν, ἃ rare word—perhaps 
borrowed from Job xxxv. 16, ἐν ἀγνωσίᾳ 
ῥήματα βαρύνει, He multiplieth words 
without knowledge. In 1 Cor. xv. 34, 
ἀγνωσίαν yap Gon TLVES ἔχουσιν, it is 
derived from Sap. xiii. 1, ols παρῆν θεοῦ 
ἀγνωσία. It is the opposite of γνῶσις 
(ἀγνωσίας - τε καὶ γνώσεως, Plato, Soph., 
267 B) cf. ἄγνοια, of Jews who crucified 
Jesus, Acts iii, 17.—T@v ἀφρόνων = 
the foolish men who calumniate you (1 2. 
&. is very common in the Wisdom litera- 
ture (especially Proverbs); as used by 
Our Lord (Luke xi. 40) and St. Paul (2 Cor. 
xi.); it implies lack of insight, a point of 
view determined by external appearances. 
Ver. 16. ὡς ἐλεύθεροι, the con- 
trast with τῆς κακίας supports the 
connection of é. in thought with ἀγαθο- 


TIETPOY A 


ἀνθρώπων ἀγνωσία - 
τες τῆς κακίας τὴν 


βεῖσθε, τὸν βασιλέα τει 
, La} , 
$6Bw τοῖς δεσπόταις, 


A 
καὶ ἐπιεικέσι ἀλλὰ καὶ 


Il. 


ὡς ἐλεύθεροι καὶ μὴ 
ἐλευθερίαν ἀλλ᾽ ὡς 


σατε: τὴν ἀδελφότη τα ἀγαπᾶτε 


pate. ot οἰκέται ὕπο 
οὐ μόνον τοῖς 


τοῖς σκολιοῖς. τοῦτο 


ποιοῦντας, which explains the nature of 
the self-subjection required. Christians 
are free (Matt. xvii. 26 f. qg.v.; John viii. 
36; Gal. ii. 4) and therefore must sub- 
mit to authority. Peter generalises sum- 
marily St. Paul’s argument in Gal. v. 13, 
which refers to internal relations.—Kx at 
py. - + ἐλευθερίαν, and not having 
your freedom as a cloak of your malice. 
For ἐπ. cf. Menander (apud Stobaeum 
Florileg.) πλοῦτος δὲ πολλῶν ἐπικάλυμμ᾽ 
ἐστιν κακῶν. The verb is used in Ps. 


cited Rom. iv. 7 = "55; and this sense 
may perhaps be contemplated here ; early 
Christians regarded their freedom as con- 
stituting a propitiation for future as for 
past sins. 

Ver. 17. Sweeping clause based partly 
on Rom. xiii. 7 f. (cf. Matt. xxii. 21), 
partly on Prov. xxiv. 21, φοβοῦ τὸν θεὸν 
υἱὲ καὶ βασιλέα καὶ μηθετέρῳ αὐτῶν 
ἀπειθήσῃς. -- πάντας τιμήσατε. 
The aorist imperative is used because the 
present would be ambiguous; cf. ἀπό- 
Sorte, Rom. l.c., and for matter, Rom. xii. 
το, TH τιμῇ ἀλλήλους προηγούμενοι, 
since πάντας covers both the brotherhood 
and the emperor.—ot οἰκέται, voca- 
tive; the word is chosen as being milder 
than δοῦλος and also as suggesting the 
parallel between slaves and Christians 
who are God’s household (ii. 5)-—0 π᾿ o- 
τασσόμενοι has force of imperative 
resuming ὑποτάγητε or goes with τιμ- 
ήσατε (17) as being a particular applica- 
tion of that general principle—rots 
δεσπόταις, to your masters, not ex- 
cluding God, the Master of all, as is indi- 
cated by the insertion of in ail fear (cf. 
17, etc.) and τοῖς ἀγαθοῖς καὶ ἐπιεικέσιν 
(cf. Ps. Ixxxvi. 4» σὺ κύριος χρηστὸς καὶ 
ἐπιεικής).--τοῖς σκολι ots, the per- 
verse, cf. Phil. ii. 15, ἵνα γένησθε Foss 
τέκνα θεοῦ ἄμωμα μέσον γενεᾶς σκολιᾶς 
καὶ διεστραμμένης, where the full phrase 


is cited from Deut. xxxii. 5 (ox. = Wy) 


The Vulgate has dyscolis = Oe te 
Hesychius, σκολιός. ἄδικος ; Prov. xxviii. 
18, ὃ σκολιαῖς ὁδοῖς πορευόμενος χ. ὁ 
πορευόμενος δικαίως. 

Vv. 19 f. Summary application of the 
teaching of Jesus recorded in Luke vi. 27- 


16—23. 


yap χάρις εἰ διὰ συνίδη 
ἀδίκως. ποῖον γὰρ κλέος εἰ ἁ 
μενοι  ὕπομε 

ὑπομενεῖτε, τοῦ το χάρις παρὰ Θῶ. 


εἰ = 
OTL καὶ Xs ἔπαθεν 6 


TIETPOY A 


σιν 06 ὑποφέρει τις 
μαρτάνοντες καὶ κο 
vette ; ἀλλ᾽ εἰ ἀγαθοποι 

εἰς 
πὲρ ὑμῶν ὑμῖν ὕπο 


61 


λύπας πάσχων 

λαφιζό- 29 
οῦντες καὶ πάσχον τες 
τοῦτο γὰρ ἐκλήθητε 21 


λιμπάνων ὕπογραμ, 


Ν - > Xr , a ᾿᾿ > A ΕΣ 
μὸν ἵνα ἐπακολουβηή σηται τοῖς ἴχνεσιν αὐτοῦ - ὃς 22 
’ , a 
ἁμαρτίαν οὐκ ἐποίησεν οὐδὲ εὑρέθη δόλος ἐν τῶ στόματι 
αὐτοῦ ὃς λοι δορούμενος οὐκ ἀν τελοιδόρει πάσχων οὐκ 23 


1 The third corrector of Codex Sinaiticus puts κολαζόμενοι for κολαφιζόμενοι with 


the assent of some cursives. 


Such variations may be due to careless copying or 


they may result from erroneous expansion and interpretation of abbreviations. 


36 = Matt. v. 39-48.—x άρις seems to 
‘be an abbreviation of the O.T. idiom to 


Jind favour qn) with God—cf. χάρις 
παρὰ θεῷ (20)—taken from St. Luke’s ver- 
sion of the saying, εἰ ἀγαπᾶτε τοὺς aya- 
πῶντας ὑμᾶς, ποία ὑμῖν χάρις ἔστιν (vi. 
32).— Compare χάριτας = ps that 


which is acceptable in Prov. x. 32.--διὰ 
συνείδησιν θεοῦ, (i.) because God 
is conscious of your condition (θεοῦ sub- 
jective genitive), a reproduction of thy 
Father which seeth that which is hidden 
. (Matt. vi. 4, etc.); so συνείδ. in 
‘definite philosophical sense of conscience 
is usually followed by possessive geni- 
tive OR (ii.) because you are conscious of 
God (0. objective genitive), cf. o. apap- 
“τίας, Heb. x. 2. The Jatter construction 
is preferable: the phrase interprets διὰ 
τὸν κύριον with the help of the Pauline 
expression διὰ τὴν o. (Rom. xiii. 5 ; τ Cor. 
x. 25) employed in the same context.— 
πάσχων ἀδίκως, emphatic. Peter 
has to take account of the possibility 
which Jesus ignored, that Christians 
might deserve persecution ; cf. 20, 25.— 
ποῖον κλέος, what praise rather than 
what kind of reputation («X. neutral as in 
Thuc. ii. 45) cf. ποία χάρις τίνα μισθόν, 
Matt. kA. (only twice in Job in LXX) 
corresponds to ἔπαινος above: χάρις 
παρὰ θεῷ shows that the praise of the 
Master who reads the heart is intended.— 
κολαφιζόμενοι, from description 
of the Passion, Mark xiv. 65, ἤρξαντό 
τινες ... κολαφίζειν αὐτόν: cf. Matt. 
ν. 39, ὅστις oe ῥαπίζει. So also St. 
Paul recalls the parallel between Christ’s 
and the Christians’ sufferings (1 Cor. iv. 
II) κολαφιζόμεθα. --- ἀ γαθοποιοῦν- 
τες, opposed to ἁμαρτάνοντες, explains 
ἀδίκως (19).—xX 4 pts, see ON x. ver. Ig. 
Ver. 21. εἰς τοῦτο, sc. to do well 
and to suffer, if need be, without flinch- 


ing, as Christ did.—_é« An One, sc. by 
God; cf. διὰ τὴν συνείδησιν θεοῦ.--- 
ἔπαθεν ὑπὲρ 7p Oy, ver. 22 supplies 
the essential point, which would be readily 
supplied, but Christ’s suffering was un- 
deserved (δίκαιος ὑπὲρ ἀδίκων, iii. 13).— 
καί also with reference to the similar 
experience of Christians; so Phil. ii. 5, 
τοῦτο φρονεῖτε ἐν ὑμῖν ὃ Kal ἐν Χριστῷ. 
--ὁπογραμμόν (τ) outline, 2 Macc. 
ii. 28, to enlarge upon the outlines of our 
abridgment ; (2) copy-head, pattern, to be 
traced over by writing-pupils (Plato, 
Protag., 227 D; Clement of Alexandria, 
Stvom., v. 8, 49, gives three examples of 
which βεδιζαμψχθωπληκτρον σφιγξ is 
one). —é€makohov0yHonTeE, remini- 
scence of Jesus’ word to Peter, ἀκολου- 
θήσεις ὕστερον, John xiii. 36. 

Ver. 22 = Isa. liii. 9, ap. being put for 


ἀνομίαν (DPT) and εὗρ. δόλος (so 
SoC? AQ, etc.) for δόλον ( = Heb.) of 
LXX. The latter variation is due to con- 
junction of Zeph. iii. 13, οὐ μὴ εὑρεθῇ έν 
τῷ στόματι αὐτῶν γλῶσσα δολία : Christ 
being identified with the Remnant. The 
former appears in the Targum: ‘‘ that 
they might not remain who work sin and 
might not speak guile with their mouth”’. 

Ver. 23. Combination of the Scripture 
οὐκ ἀνοίγει τὸ στόμα (Isa. lili. 7) with 
the saying ὅταν ὀνειδίσωσιν και διώξωσιν 
(Matt. v. rr). For λοιδ. cf. τ Cor. iv. 
12. λοιδορούμενοι εὐλογοῦμεν (εἴπωσιν 
πᾶν πονηρόν of Matt. l.c.), John ix. 28, 
the Jews ἐλοιδόρησαν the once blina 
man as Jesus’ disciple and, for O.T. type 
Deut. xxxiii. 8, ἐλοιδόρησαν αὐτὸν ἐπὶ 
ὕδατος ἀντιλογίας (Levi = Christ the 
Priest, cf. ἀντιλογία, Heb. xii. 3).--οὐ κ 
ἠπείλει, the prophecy ἀπειλήσει τοῖς 
ἀπειθοῦσιν (Isa. lxvi. 14) is yet to be ful- 
filled (Luke xiii. 27). Ocec. notes that He 
threatened Judas, seeking to deter him 
and reviled the Pharisees, but not in re- 


62 


24 ἠπείλει παρεδί 
ὑμῶν αὐτὸς ἀνή 
ἵνα ταῖς ἁμαρτίαις & 

25 τῶ μώλωπι ' ἰάθηται. 

στράφη 

III. 1 ὑμῶν. 


ε , 
ομοι 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


δου δὲ τῶ κρείνοντι 
νεγκεν ἐν τῶ σώμα 


an ya a é 
τε νῦν ἐπὶ τὸν ToL 
ὡς γυναῖκες ὕποτασ 


II. 24—25. III. 


, a x ε Pee 
Sikaiws: ὃς Tas ἁμαρτίας. 
τι αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ τὸ ξύλο 


πογενόμενοι τῆ δικοσύνη ζήσωμεν - οὗ 
ὡς πρόβατα πλανώμε 


νοι ἀλλὰ ἐπε- 
ψυχῶν. 
, “ 395. " 
σόμεναι τοῖς ἰδίοις 


να καὶ ἐπίσκοπον τῷ 


® The superfluous, αὐτοῦ after οὗ τῷ μώλωπι is omitted by Codex Vaticanus and. 


other authorities. 


It would be repugnant to the ear of a Greek, but is not there- 


fore to be regarded as necessarily absent from the original. 


tort.—apedtSov. It is doubtful what 
object, if any, is to be supplied. The 
narrative of the Passion suggests two 
renderings: (1) He delivered Himself 
(ἑαυτὸν omitted as in Plato, Phaedrus, 
250 E). Cf. Luke xxiii. 46 (Ps. xxxi. 5), 
παρατίθεμαι τὸ πνεῦμά μου and Isa. liii. 
6; κύριος παρέδωκεν αὐτόν, 10. 12 παρε- 
δόθη. (ii.) He delivered the persecutors 
(latent in passive participles λοιδ. and 
πάσχων), when He said Father forgive 
them. In ordinary Greek παραδίδωμι 
without object = permit ; but this hardly 
justifies the rendering He gave way to 
(cf. δότε τόπον τῇ ὀργῇ, Rom. xii. 19), 
i.é., permitted God to fulfil His will. But 
most probably παρ. τῷ . - . represents 


the Hebrew ellipse, “5 by by commit to 
Fehovah (Ps. xxii. 9) for the normal com- 
mit, way, works, cause; LXX (Syriac) 
has ἤλπισεν = Matt. xxvii. 43. Compare 
Joseph. Ant. vii. 9, 2, David wept πάντων 
ἐπιτρέψας κριτῇ TO θεῷ.--τῷ Kpt- 
νοντι δικαίως, οὗ, i. 17; the award 
was the glory. 

Ver. 24. Christ was not only well-doer 
but benefactoy.—ras Gp... . ἀνήνε- 
y «ev comes from Isa. liii. 12, LXX, καὶ 
αὐτὸς ἁμαρτίας πολλῶν ἀνήνεγκεν (175. 
usually translated λαμβάνειν), used also 
Heb. ix. 28. Christ is the perfect sin- 
offering: “ Himself the victim and Him- 
self the priest. The form of expression 
offered up our sins is due to the double 


use of INDI for sin and sin-offering. 
—év τῷ σώματι αὐτοῦ, a Pauline 
phrase derived from the saying, This ts 
my body which is for you (1 Cor. xi. 24), 
explaining αὐτός of Isa. ἰ.ε.--ἐπὶ τὸ 
ξύλον, replaces the normal comple- 
ment of ἀναφέρειν, ἐπὶ τὸ θυσιαστήριον, 
in view of the moral which is to be 
drawn from the sacrificial language 
adopted. So Jas. ii. 21, ἐπὶ τὸ θυσια- 
στήριον is substituted for ἐπάνω τῶν 
ξύλων of the original description of the 
offering of Isaac, Gen. xxii. 9. Christ 


died because He took our sins upon Him- 
self A. Num. iv. 33, οἱ viol ὑμῶν .. - 
ἀνοίσουσιν τὴν πορνείαν ὑμῶν). There- 
fore our sins perished and we have died to 
them, Col. 11. 14.—tva... ζήσωμεν. 
Compare Targum of Isa. liii. 10, ‘and 
from before Jehovah it was the will to: 
refine and purify the remnant of His 
people that He might cleanse from sins 
their souls: they shall see the kingdom of 
His Christ and .. . prolong their days”’. 
--ἀπογενόμενοι = (i.) die (Herodo- 
tus, Fhucydides) as opposite of γενόμενοι, 
come into being OR (1...) be free from, as 
in Thuc. i. 39, τῶν ἁμαρτημάτων ἀπο- 
γενόμενοι. The Dative requires (i, ), ὩΣ 

Kom. vi. 2; οἵτινες ἀπεθάνομεν τῇ ἅμαρ- 
τίᾳ. The idea is naturally deduced 
from Isa. liii., Christ bore our sins and 
delivered His soul to death, therefore He 
shall see His seed living because sinless.. 
—ot...id@nre from Isa. lili. 5; 
μώλωπι, properly the weal or scar pro- 
duced by scourgeing (Sir. xxviii. 17, πληγὴ 
μάστιγος ποιεῖ μώλωπας) thus the pro- 
phecy was fulfilled according to Matt. 

XXVii. 26, φραγελλώσας. The original 
has id@npev. The paradox is especially 
pointed in an address to slaves who were 
frequently scourged. 


Ver. 25 = Isa. liii. 6, πάντες ὡς πρό- 
Bara ἐπλανήθημεν combined with Ez. 
xxxiv. 6, where this conception of the 
people and their teachers (the shepherds 
of Israel) is elaborated and the latter de- 
nounced because τὸ πλανώμενον οὐκ 
ἐπεστρέψατε. Further the use of this 
metaphor in the context presupposes the 
saying I am the good shepherd. . . . I lay 
down my life for the sheep (John xii. 15). 
--ἐπίσκοπον, of. Ez. xxxiv. II, ἰδοὺ. 
ἐγὼ ἐκζητήσω. τὰ πρόβατά βου καὶ 
ἐπισκέψομαι αὐτά. It is to be noted 
that the command which Jesus laid on 
Peter, feeding sheep, comes from Ez. l.c. 

CuaPTerR III.— Vv. 1-6. Duty of 
wives (Eph. v. 21-24; Col. iii. 18; Tit. 
ii. 4)—Submissiveness and true adorn- 


I—4. 


ἀνδράσιν - ἵνα εἴ ties! 
ἀναστροφῆς ἄνευ λό 
τὴ ἐν φόβω ἁγνὴν ἀνα 
ἔξωθεν ἐμπλοκῆς τριχῶν κα, 
ἱματίω κόσμος ᾿ ἀλλ᾽ ὃ κρυπτὸς 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


γου κερδηθήσονται 


στροφὴν ὑμῶν. 
περιθέσεως χρυσίω 


ἀπειθοῦσιν τῶ λόγω διὰ τῆς τῶν γυναικῶ᾽ 


> , 

ἐποπτεύσαντες 2 

ὧν ἔστω οὐχ 63 
ἢ ἐνδύσεως 


τῆς καρδίας ἄνθρωπος 4 


1 The variant οἵτινες for εἴ τινες serves as a reminder that in uncial manuscripts 
€ is apt to be confused with O and that words were not written separately from one 


another. 


ment.—tots ἰδίοις ἀνδράσιν, your 
own husbands, the motive for submissive- 
ness, Eph. v. 22; Tit. ii. 4. St. Peter 
assumes knowledge of the reason alleged 
by St. Paul (Eph. 1... ; 1 Cor. xi. 3) after 
Gen. iii. 16, αὐτός σου κυριεύσει.--καὶ 
ae es γῳ, even if in some cases your 
husbands are disobedient to the word 
(ii. 8), i.e. remain heathens in spite of the 
preaching of the Gospel. St. Paul found 
it necessary to impress upon the Corin- 
thian Church that this incompatibility of 
religion did not justify dissolution of mar- 
riage (1 Cor. xii. 10 8).--ἄνευ λόγου, 
without word from their wives. Peter 
deliberately introduces A. in its ordinary 
sense immediately after the technical τῷ 
A.—an example of what the grammarians 
call antanaclasis and mena pun. In his 
provision for the present and future wel- 
fare of the heathen husbands whose 
wives come under his jurisdiction he 
echoes the natural aspiration of Jews and 
Greeks; so Ben Sira said, a silent woman 
isa gift of the Lord... a loud crying 
woman and a scold shall be sought out 
to drive away enemies (Sir. xxvi. 14, 27) 
and Sophocles, Silence is the proper orna- 
ment (κόσμος) for women (Ajax 293). St. 
Paul forbids women to preach or even 
ask questions at church meeting (1 Cor. 
xiv. 34: at Corinth they had been used to 
prophesy and pray).—tva ... κερδη- 
θήσονται, be won, cf. ἵνα κερδήσω i in 
1 Cor. ix. 20 ff. =tva ... σώσω, 1b. 22, 
(cf.vii. 16.). 

Ver. 2. ἐποπτεύσαντε Sy having 
contemplated ; ΕΒ ΘΗ Tie 12k) TV. 21 
ὑμῶν. ἐν φόβῳ, cf. i. 17 and Eph. 
ὙΠ 1: ὑποτασσόμενοι ἀλλήλοις ἐν φόβῳ 
Χριστοῦ " αἱ “γυναῖκες : as no object is 
expressed, τοῦ θεοῦ must be supplied.— 
ἁ γνήν, not merely chaste but pure, cf. 
i. 22 and iii. 4. 

Ver. 3. The description of the external 
ornaments proper to heathen society 
seems to be based on Isa. iii. 17-23, where 
the destruction of the hair, jewels and 
raiment of the daughters of Zion is fore- 
τοϊά.--ἐμπλοκῆς τριχῶν, braiding 


of hair. i Tim. ii. 19, πλέγμασιν καὶ 
χρυσίῳ refers to the golden combs and 
nets used for the purpose; cf. ἐμπλόκια, 


Isa. iii. 18, for OHIO. Juvenal de- 
scribes the elaborate coiffures which Ro- 
man fashion prescribed for the Park and 
attendance at the Mysteries of Adonis: tot 
premit ordinibus tot adhuc compagibus 
altum aedificat caput (Sat. vi. 492-504). 
Clement of Alexandria quotes 1 Peter iii. 
1-4, in his discussion of the whole subject 
(Paed., 111. xi.); and in regard to this 
particular point says ἀπόχρη μαλάσσειν 
τὰς τρίχας καὶ ἀναδεῖσθαι τὴν κόμην 
ἐντελῶς περόνῃ τινι λιτῇ παρὰ τὸν 
αὐχένα Ἦν καὶ γὰρ αἱ “περιπλοκαὶ τῶν 
τριχῶν αἱ ἑταιρικαὶ καὶ αἱ τῶν σειρῶν 
ἀναδέσεις . . -. κόπτουσι τὰς τρίχας 
ἀποτίλλουσαι ταῖς πανούργοις ἐμπλο- 
Kats, because of which they do not even 
touch their own head for fear of disturb- 
ing their hair—nay more sleep comes to 
them with terror lest they should un- 
awares spoil τὸ σχῆμα τῆς ἐμπλοκῆς 
(p. 290 Ρ).--περιθέσεως χρυσίων, 
1.€., tings bracelets, εἴς.» enumerated in 
Isa. 1...--ἐνδύσεως t ἱματίων. Stress 
might be laid on κόσμος, or the crowning 
prohibition regarded as an exaggeration 
intended to counteract an ingrained bias. 
In either case the expression points to a 
remarkable precedent for this teaching in 
Plato’s Republic IV., iii. ff. ‘‘ Plato’s as- 
signment of common duties and common 
training to the two sexes is part of a 
well-reasoned and deliberate attempt by 
the Socratic school to improve the posi- 
tion of women in Greece. . . . Socrates’ 
teaching inaugurated an era of protest 
against the old Hellenic view of things. 
. . - In later times the Stoics constituted 
themselves champions of similar views’ 
(Adam, ad loc.). Accordingly gymnastics 
must be practised by women as by men: 
ἀποδυτέον δὴ ταῖς τῶν φυλάκων γυναιξὶν 
ἐπείπερ ἀρετὴν ἀντὶ ἱματίων ἀμφιέ- 
σονται. 

Ver. 4. Yours be the secret man of the 
heart not the outward ornament. A better 
antithesis and a pretty paradox would be 


ἐν τῶ ἀφθάρτῶ τοῦ 

5 ἐνώπιον τοῦ OD πολυ 
γυναῖκες 

6 σόμεναι τοῖς 
“ABpadp κύριον αὐτὸν 

ἡ θοποιοῦ 


TIETPOY A 


ε , 4 
ἡσυχίου καὶ πραέως 
id 
τελές. 
αἱ ἐλπίζουσαι εἰς OV 
ἰδίοις ἀνδράσιν - ὡς 
καλοῦσα. 
σαι, καὶ μὴ φοβούμε 


ΠῚ. 


πνεύματος ὅ ἐστιν 
} Ν ε o 

οὕτως γάρ πο τε καὶ al ἅγιαι 

ἐκόσμουν ἑαυτὰς ὑ ποτασ- 
Σάρρα ὑπήκουεν τῶ 

Φ- 5 ηθ 

ἧς ἐγενήθη 

δεμί snot .t 

ναι μηδεμίαν πτόησί. 


τε τέκνα, ἀγα- 
” 
ἄνδρες 


1 πτῶσιν for πτόησιν illustrates the danger of cursive writing, in which the liga- 
ture of two letters is apt to alter the normal shape of one or both. 


secured by supplying ἄνθρωπος with ὁ 
ἔξωθεν and taking x. as predicate: your 
ornament be cf. οὕτως ἐκόσμουν ἑαυτάς 
(ver. 5). But the order in ver. 3 is 
against this and a Greek reader would 
naturally think of the other sense of xk. = 
world universe and remember that man 
is a microcosm and ‘the universe the 
greatest and most perfect man” (Philo, 
Ρ. 471 M.).—6 κρυπτὸς τῆς καρδίας 
ἄνθρωπος, the hidden man that is the 
heart (or which belongs to the heart) is 
the equivalent of the Pauline inner man 
(Rom. vii. 22), i.e, Mind as contrasted 
with the outward man, i.e., flesh (Rom. 
l.c., cf. 2 Cor. iv. 16), St. Peter employs 
the terms used in the Sermon on the 
Mount; cf. St. Paul’s ὁ ἐν τῷ κρυπτῷ 
᾿Ιουδαῖος and περιτομὴ καρδίας, Rom. 11. 
29.—év τῷ ἀφθάρτῳ, clothed in the 
incorruptible thing (or ornament, sc. κό- 
op) contrasted with corruptible goldens ; 
cf. Jas. 11. 2, ἀνὴρ . . - ἐν ἐσθῆτι 
λαμπρᾷ. --τοῦ . .. πνεύματος, 
namely, the meck and quiet spirit. The 
adjectives are perhaps derived from the 
version of Isa. Ixvi. 2, known to Clement 
of Rome (Ep. i. xiii. 4), ἐπὶ τίνα ἐπιβλέψω 
ἀλλ᾽ ἢ ἐπὶ τὸν πρᾳὺν Kal ἡσύχιον καὶ 
τρέμοντά μου τὰ λόγια. Jesus professed 
Himself, πρᾳὺς καὶ ταπεινὸς τῇ καρδίᾳ. 
For πνεύματος compare πνεῦμα ἅγι- 
ὡσύνης, Rom. i. 4. In Rom. ii. 29, av. is 
coupled with heart as contrasted with 
fiesh and outwardness. 6 which spirit 
or the posssesion of which reference.— 
πολυτελές suggests use of conception 
of Wisdom which is precious above rubies 
(Prov. iii. 15, etc.); cf. Jas. i. 21, iii. 13, 
ἐν πρᾳύτητι σοφίας and description of 
the wisdom from above, ib. 17. 

Ver. 5. ποτε refers vaguely to O.T. 
history as part of αἷ .. «θεόν. Refer- 
ences to the holy women of the O.T. are 
rare in N.T. and this appeal to their ex- 
ample illustrates the affinity of Peter to 
Heb. (xi. 11, 35). 
viously appropriate type (cf. Luke i. with 
2 Sam. 1 f.); but Peter is thinking of the 
traditional idealisation of Sarah. 


Hannah is the ob-: 


Ver. δ. ὡςξ.. «καλοῦσα: lhe 
only evidence that can be adduced from 
the O.T. narrative is Savah laughed with- 
in herself and said... “ but my lord is 
old” (Gen. xviii. 12). The phrase, if 
pressed, implies a nominal subjection as of 
a slave to her lord, but the context at any 
rate excludes any hope in God. Philo, 
who starts with the assumption that 
Sarah is Virtue, evades the difficulty; her 
laughter was the expression of her joy, 
she denied it for fear of usurping God’s 
prerogative of laughter (de Aobr., ii. p. 
30 M). The Rabbinic commentaries 
dwell upon the title accorded to Abraham 
and draw the same inference as Peter ; 
but there are also traces of a tendency to 
exalt Sarah “the princess’ as superior 
to her husband in the gift of prophecy, 
which St. Peter may wish to correct (as 
St. James corrects the exaggerated re- 
spect paid to Elijah, Jas.v.17).—hs..- 
τέκνα. Christian women became chil- 
dren of Sarah who is Virtue or Wisdom 
(Philo) just as men became children of 
Abraham. But the fact that they were 
Christians is still in the background; the 
essential point is that they must do the 
works traditionally ascribed to Sarah (cf. 
Rom. iv.; John viii.) and so justify their 
technical parentage, whether natural or 
acquired. Oec. compares Isa. li. 2, Sarah 
your mother.—aya8omovrovaat, the 
present participle emphasises the need 
for continuance of the behaviour appro- 
priate to children of Sarah—py... 
πτόησιν, from Prov. iii. 25, LXX. 
Peter regards Sarah’s falsehood (Gen. /.c.) 
as the yielding to a sudden terror for 
which she was rebuked by God. Fear- 
lessness then is part of the character 
which is set before them for imitation 
and it is the result of obedience to the 
voice of Wisdom. Rabbinic exegesis as 
sociates the ideas of ornament with the 
promised child and that of peace between 
husband and wife with the whole incident. 

Ver. 7. Duty of husbands to their 
wives. Application of principle πάντας 
τιμήσατε.--κατὰ γνῶσιν, for the 


5—I10. 


’ a - - 
ὁμοίως συνοι κοῦντες κατὰ γνῶσι 


τῶ γυναικείω ἀπο 

χάριτος ζωῆς εἰς τὸ 
τὸ δὲ τέλος, πάντες ὁ 

εὔσπλαγ χνοι ταπεινόφρονες " 


ἢ λοιδορί αν ἀντὶ λοιδορίας - Tod 


er > A > 
OTL ELS τοῦτο € 


woman is the weaker vessel—the pot— 
which the stronger—the cauldron—may 
easily smash (Sir. xiii. 2). ὡς, κιτιλ. 
point with comma after γνῶσιν and τιμήν. 
σκεύει. The comparison of Creator 
and creature to potter and clay is found 
first in Isa. xxix. 16, but is latent in the 


description of the creation (Ὁ) of 
Adam from the dust of the earth (Gen. ii. 
7 f.). In the prophets it is developed 
and applied variously (Isa. xlv. 9 f., Ixiv. 
8; Jer. xviii. 6). In Sap. xv. 7, there is 
an elaborate description of the maker of 
clay images, in which σκεῦος replaces 
πλάσμα and vessels which serve clean 
uses are distinguished from the contrary 
sort. Thence St. Paul adopts the figure 
and employs it to illustrate the absolute 
sovereignty of the Creator, as Isaiah had 
done (see Rom. ix. 21), distinguishing 
vessels intended for honour from those in- 
tended for dishonour. Lastly 2 Tim. ii. 
20 exemplifies the particular application 
of the figure, on which Peter’s use of 
σκεῦος rests—év μεγάλῃ δὲ οἰκίᾳ (τ Peter 
ii. 5,iv.17)...«.1t.A. The comparative 
ἀσθενεστέρῳ proves that both husband 
and wife are vessels and assists to exclude 
the notion that St. Paul could mean 
to call a wife the vessel of her husband 
in 1 Thess. iv. 4.--ὡς ... ζωῆς, 
inasmuch as they are also heirs with you 
of the grace (i. 10, 13) of life (ii. 24): the 
heavenly inheritance is not distributed ac- 
cording to earthly custom, which gave 
the wife no rights of her own.—ets ... 
ὑμῶν. If the prayers are those of all 
(ver. 8) compare 1 Cor. vii. (τὴν ὀφειλὴν 
ἀποδιδότω .. . ἵνα σχολάσητε τῇ προ- 
σευχῇ). Peter teaches that married life 
need not—if the wife be properly hon- 
oured—hinder religious duties, as St. 
Paul feared (ἰδ. 32 ff.). If ὑμῶν = you 
husbands (as v.1, συγκληρονόμοι requires) 
cf. Jas. v. 4. 

Vv. 8 f. Sweeping clause addressed to 
ali, inculcating detailed φιλαδελφία after 
Rom. xii. 10, 15-17. 

Ver. 8. TO... τέλος, finally. 
Oecumenius brings out the possible con- 
notations of the word goal and also the 


TIETPOY A 


νέμοντες τειμὴν ὡς 
μὴ ἐγκόπτεσθαι ταῖς 
μόφρονες συμπαθεῖς 
μὴ ἀποδιδόντες κακὸ 


κλήθητε, ἵνα εὐλογία 


05 


ὡς ἀσθενεστέρω σκεύ εἰ 


καὶ συγκληρονόμοις 
προσευχαῖς ὑμῶν. 

φιλάδελφοι 8 

ἀντὶ κακοῦ 9 


’ Q > oe 
ναντίον δὲ εὐλογοῦ τες, 


κληρονομήσητε. 


law for all love since love is the end of 
the law._opddpoves, of one mind, 
united, an Epic word. St. Paul’s τὸ αὐτὸ 
φρονεῖν but here wider than parallel ex- 
pressing Rom. xii. 16, τὸ αὐτὸ εἰς 
ἀλλήλους φρονοῦντες.--συμπαθεῖς 
summarises χαίρειν μετὰ χαιρόντων 
κλαίειν μετὰ κλαιόντων of Rom. xii. 
15; of. Heb. iv. 15 (of Christ), x. 34 
(particular example of sympathy with 
“the prisoners”).—d@tAadSeAdou, cf. 
i. 122; Rom. xii. τὸ, τῇ φιλαδελφίᾳ 
εἰς ἀλλήλους φιλόστοργοι. ---Ἠεὔσπ.λ- 
αγχνοι, kind-hearted, in Eph. iv. 
32 (only here in N.T.) coupled with 
kind . . forgiving one anothe: ; 
epithet of Jehovah in Prayer of Manasses, 
ver. 7 = compassionate, in accordance 
with metaphorical use of σπλάγχνα «.7.A. 


derived from different senses of OF]. 
Here = ἐνδύσασθε. . . τὰ σπλάγχνα 
τῆς χρηστότητος, (ο].--  ταπεινό- 
φρονες -- τοῖς ταπεινοῖς συναπαγόμε- 
νοι; Rom. xii. 16, cf. Prov. xxix. 23, LXX, 
insolence humbleth a man but the humble 
(ταπεινόφρονας) Fehovah stayeth with 
glory (x. ὕβρις). 

Ver.g. μὴ . - - κακοῦ, from Rom. 
ἘΠῚ 17} δ᾽. 0 MESSaiVs, πρὶν Prov. .xx., 22) 
Say not I will recompense evil (LXX 
τίσομαι τὸν ἐχθρόν) : an approximation 
to Christ’s repeal of the lex talionis (Matt. 
v. 38 ff.) which Plato first opposed among 
the Greeks (See Crito., p. 49, with Adam’s 
note).—AotSopiav ἀντὶ λοιδο- 
ρίας refers to pattern left by Christ (ii. 
23). ---τοὐναντίον, contrariwise.— 
εὐλογοῦντες with λοιδ., τ Cor. iv. 
21 ; cf. Rom. xii. 14, εὐλογεῖτε τοὺς διώ- 
κοντας = Luke vi. 28.--ὅτι. .. κλη- 
ρονομήσητε, Christians must do as 
they hope to be done by. They are 
the new Israel called to inherit blessing 
in place of the Jews, who are reprobate 
like Esau; cf. Heb. xii. 17, ἴστε yap ὅτι 
καὶ μετέπειτα θέλων κληρονομῆσαι τὴν 
εὐλογίαν ἀπεδοκιμάσθη. So St. Paul re- 
verses the current view which identified 
the Jews with Isaac and the Gentiles 
with Ishmael (Gal. iv. 22 ff.). 

Vv. 10-12 = Ps, xxxiv. 12-17a. intro- 


610 


66 


γὰρ 
παυσάτω τὴν γλῶσ 
11ὃδό λον. 
12 tyr 


Ν ’ 
ἐπὶ δικαί 


ἐκκλεινάτω δὲ 


13 δὲ Ku ἐπὶ 
14 εἰ τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ Ly 


δικαιοσύνην, μακά ριοι. 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


θέλων ζωὴν ἀγαπᾶ, 
, 
σαν ἀπὸ κακοῦ, Kal χεί 


σάτω εἰρήνην, καὶ δι 
ους, καὶ ὦτα αὐτοῦ 


ποιοῦντας κακά. 


τὸν δὲ φόβον αὐ 


Ill. 


καὶ ἰδεῖν ἡμέρας aya θὰς, 
Ay τοῦ μὴ λαλῆσαι 
σάτω ἀγαθόν" 
φϑαλμοὶ Ku 
πρόσωπον 
ὑμᾶς, 


ἀπὸ κακοῦ καὶ ποιη 
wfdtw αὐτήν, ὅτι ὁ 
3 , > cal 
εἰς δέησιν aitar- 
A , 
καὶ τίς 6 κακώσων 


λωταὶ! γένοισθε3 BX Nel καὶ πάσχοιτεδι 4 
Vy oX 


τῶν μὴ φοβηθῆτε 


1 For ζηλωταὶ three secondary uncials substitute μιμηται. 
2 Codex Vaticanus is alone in reading γένοισθε for γενησθε (the first hand of 


Codex Sinaiticus has γενεσθαι). 


duced by mere γάρ as familiar. The lips 
of Christians who wish to love life must 
be free from cursing and from guile as 
were Christ’s (cf. Isa. apud ii. 23). If 
Jehovah is to hear their petition as He 
heard Christ’s they also must turn from 
evil and do good (cf. ἀγαθοποιεῖν above) 
seeking peace within and without the 
Church. 

Ver. 10. Peter omits the rhetorical 
question tis ἐστιν ἄνθρωπος, which in- 
troduces 6 θέλων in the original (LXX 
= Hebrew) but is influenced by it in the 
substitution of the third for the second 
person throughout. The change of 
ἀγαπῶν (= Hebrew) to ἀγαπᾶν καὶ re- 
moves the barbarisms θέλων ζωήν and 
ἀγαπῶν ἰδεῖν (= Hebrew) and secures 
the balance between the clauses disturbed 
by the omission of the opening words.— 
ἰδεῖν Ap. ἀγαθάς is the natural 
sequel of the alteration of the original 
(days to see good), which is already found 
in the LXX (Hp. t. ἄγα θά ς).---[ ὦ ήν = 
earthly life in the original corresponding 
to days. The text adopted by Peter 
makes it mean eternal life, parallel good 
days. Only with this interpretation is the 
quotation pertinent to his exhortation : cf. 
that ye might inherit blessing (g) with 
Sellow-inheritors of the grace of life ( (7).— 
παυσάτω, K.T.d., “parallel ἐμὴ τ» 
λοιδορίαν (9) ; cf. ii. 22 ἔ. 

Ver. 12. πρόσωπον Κυρίου, 
‘¥ehovah’s face, i.e., wrath (Targum, the 
face of Fehovah was angry) as the fol- 
lowing clause, to cut off the remembrance 
of them... shows; cf. Lam. iv. 16; 
Ps. xxi. g. But Peter stops short and 
leaves room for repentance. 

Ver. 13. κακ ώσων echoes ποιοῦν- 
τας κακά (as ζηλ. τοῦ ay. echoes 
ποιησάτω ἀγαθόν) ; but the phrase comes 
also from O.T.: Isa. Πτὸν Κύριος. βοη- 
θήσει μοι" τίς κακώσει με:--τοῦ aya- 


θοῦ ζηλωταὶ. The phrase sums up 
ver. 11. All that was good in Judaism, 
however it may have been perverted, finds 
its fulfilment in the new Israel (Rom. x. 
2). Some Jews were zealots, boasting 
their zeal for the Lord or His Law, like 
Phinehas and the Hasmonaeans (τ Macc. 
ii. passim) : all Christians should be zea- 
lots for that which is good. So Paul says 
of himself as Pharisee that he was a zealot 
for his ancestral traditions (Gal. i. 14). 
For him as for the colleague of Simon 
the Zealot the word retained a flavour of 
its technical sense; cf. Tit. ii. 14, that He 
might cleanse for Himself a peculiar 
people, zealot of good (καλῶν) works ; cf. 
similar use of ἀφωρισμένος = Pharisee 


(Rom. i. 1). τοῦ ay. in emphatic posi- 
tion. 
Ver. 14.) ἄλλ᾽ ee Noe pinion 


Nay if ye should actually suffer—if some 
one, despite the prophet (13), should harm 
you—for the sake of righteousness, blessed 
are ye. Peter appeals to the saying, 
μακάριοι οἱ δεδιωγμένοι ἕνεκεν δικαι- 
οσύνης (Matt. v. το).---πάσχοιτε, εἰ 
with optative (cf. 17, εἰ θέλοι) is used to 
represent anything as generally possible 
without regard to the general or actual 
situation at the moment (Blass, Grammar, 
p- 213). The addition of καί implies that 
the contingency is unlikely to occur and 
is best represented by an emphasis on 
should. The meaning of the verb is de- 
termined by κακώσων above, if ye should 
be harmed, i.e., by persons unspecified 
(αὐτῶν). ober Fee fe vv perhaps sug- 
gested ζηλωταί, cf. τ Mace. ii. 27-29, πᾶς 
6 ζηλῶν τῷ νόμῳ. . . ἐξελθέτω. .. τότε 
κατέβησαν πολλοὶ ζητοῦντες δικ. καὶ 
κρίμα.--τὸν δὲ φόβον... ὑμῶν. 
An adaptation of Isa. viii. 12 f. LXX, τὸν 
δὲ φόβον αὐτοῦ μὴ φοβηθῆτε οὐδὲ μὴ 
ταραχθῆτε" κύριον αὐτὸν ἁγιάσατε καὶ 
αὐτός ἔσται σου φόβος. The scripture 


41---17. 


Κν δὲ τὸν XV! ἁγιάσα 

Ν ’ ‘ ~ 

πρὸς ἀπολογίαν παντὶ τῷ 

ἐν ὑμῖν ed πίδος ᾿ 
συνείδησιν ἔχοντες 
τ ~ ε > , 

αισχυ θῶσιν οἱ ἐπηρεάζον 


ἀναστροφήν" κρεῖττον γὰρ ἀγαθο 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ A 


τε ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις O 
αἰτοῦντι ὑμᾶς λογο 
ἀλλὰ μετὰ πρα 

3 oa ν 3 οὶ 
ἀγαθήν " ἵνα ἐν ᾧ 
τες ὑμῶν τὴν ἀγαθὴ. 


67 


μῶν ἕτοιμοι ἀεὶ 15 
περὶ τῆς 

, Ν , 

ύτητος καὶ φόβου 
κατα λαλεῖσθε 2 κατ- 16 
ἐν XO 
ποιοῦντας εἰ θέλοι 


17 


1 Three secondary uncials read θεόν (ON) for Χριστόν (Xv). 


*For ἐν ᾧ καταλαλεῖσθε Codex Sinaiticus with other authorities reads ἐν ᾧ 
καταλαλῶσιν ὑμῶν ὡς κακοποιῶν---4η assimilation of the text to ii. 12. 


corresponding ‘to the saying, Fear not 
them that kill the body; but fear rather 
him that can destroy both soul and body 
(Matt. x. 28 parallels Luke xii. 4 f. where 
the description of God is modified). The 
sense of the original, fear not what they 
(the people) fear; $ehovah of Hosts Him 
shall ye count holy and let Him be the 
object of your fear, has been in part 
abandoned. For it is simpler to take the 
fear as referring to the evil with which 
their enemies try to terrify them, than to 
supply the idea that their enemies employ 
the means by which they themselves 
would be intimidated. Compare iii. 6.— 
τὸν χριστόν, gloss on κύριον = Je- 
hovah; cf.ii.3.—€v ταῖς καρδίαις 
sc. mere profession. Peter is probably 
thinking of the prescribed prayer, Hal- 
lowed be thy name, elsewhere in N.T. it 
belongs to God to sanctify Christ and 
men.—€rotpout ἀεὶ πρὸς ἀπο- 
λογίαν, ready for reply. The con- 
trast between the inward hope (parallels 
sanctification of Christ in the heart) and 
the spoken defence of it is not insisted 
upon ; the second δέ is not to be accepted. 
The use of the noun in place of verb is 
characteristic of St. Peter. The play upon 
ἀπολογίαν back-word and λόγον cannot 
be reproduced. Properly speech in de- 
fence, ἃ. is used metaphorically (NB 
παντί) here as by St. Paul in x Cor. ix. 3, 
, ἢ ἐμὴ ἀπολογία τοῖς ἐμὲ ἀνακρίνουσιν ; 
where also, though another technical 
word is introduced, no reference is in- 
tended to formal proceedings in a court of 
law. St. Peter is thinking of the promise 
which he himself once forfeited for un- 
worthy fear, I will give you mouth and 
wisdom, (Luke xxi. 14f., xii. II, uses 
ἀπολογεῖσθαι: Matt. x. το, Aadetv).— 
παντὶ .. .λόγον, to every one (for 
dative cf. 1 Cor. ix. 3) that asketh of you 
an account. The phrase (compare Demos- 
thenes Against Onetor, p. 868, ἐνεκάλουν 
καὶ λόγον ἀπήτουν) recalls the Parable 
of the Steward of Unrighteousness, of 


whom his lord demanded an account 
(Luke xvi. 1 ff.), as also the metaphor of 
iv. το, ὡς καλοὶ οἰκονόμοι. --- μετὰ 
πραὕτητος καὶ φόβου, with meek- 
ness (cf. ver. 4) and fear of God (Isa. l.c. 
has the same play on the senses of fear). 
--συνείδησιν ἔχοντες ἀγαθήν, 
intermediate step between διὰ o. θεοῦ 
and the quasi-personification of o. ἀ. in 
ver. 21; so St. Paul says οὐδὲν yap 
ἐμαυτῷ σύνοιδα (τ Cor. iv. 4) but goes on 
beyond the contrast between self-judg- 
ment and that of other men to God’s 
judgment. Ver. 17 supplies the explana- 
tion here—tva...dadvactpodyy, 
generalisation of Peter’s personal experi- 
ence at Pentecost, when the Jews first 
scoffed and then were pierced to the 
heart (Acts ii. 13, 37). Misrepresentation 
is apparently the extent of their present 
suffering (17) and this they are encour- 
aged to hope may be stopped. The 
heathen will somehow be put to shame 
even if they are not converted (ii. 12).— 
ἐν ᾧ, in the matter in respect of which ; 
see ii. 12.—€mynpeadlovres, occurs 
in Luke vi. 28, προσεύχεσθε περὶ τῶν 
ἐπηρεαζόντων ὑμᾶς, and therefore consti- 
tutes another hint of contact between St. 
Luke and Peter (cf. χάρις, ii. 19). Aris- 
totle defines ἐπηρεασμός as “ hindrance 
to the wishes of another not for the sake 
of gaining anything oneself but in order 
to baulk the other”—the spirit of the 
dog in the manger. Ordinarily the verb 
means fo libel, cf. λαλῆσαι δόλον (10).— 
ὑμῶν . .. ἀναστροφήν, your 
(possessive genitive precedes noun in 
Hellenistic Greek) good-in-Christ beha- 
viour : ἕν Χριστῷ (iv. 14, 16) is practically 
equivalent to Christian, cf. if any is in 
Christ a new creature. 

Ver. 17. κρεῖττον, cf. ii. 19 f., where 
χάρις κλέος correspond to μισθὸν περισ- 
σόν of the sources.—et θέλοι τὸ 
θέλημα θεοῦ. Again optative im- 
plies that it is a purely hypothetical case 
(cf. ver. 14). For the semi-personification 


68 


18 τὸ θέλημα τοῦ OF πά 
ἅπαξ πε 
ἡμᾶς προσαγάγῃ 


of thé will of God compare Eph. i. 11, 
where the θέλημα has a βουλή ; so Paul 
is Apostle through the will of God (x Cor. 
i. 1; 2Cor.i.1). For the pleonastic ex- 
pression cf. the verbal parallel ἐάν τις 
θέλῃ τὸ θέλημα αὐτοῦ ποιεῖν, John vii. 
17. So God's patience was waiting 
(ver. 20). 


Ver.18. The advantage of suffering for 
well-doing is exemplified in the experience 
of Christ, who gained thereby quickening 
(ver. 21) and glory (ver. 22). How far the 
pattern applies to the Christian is not 
clear. Christ suffered once for all according 
to Heb. ix. 24-28 ; the Christian suffers for 
a little (v. 10), But does the Christian 
suffer also for sins? St. Paul and Igna- 
tius speak of themselves as περίψημα 
περικαθάρματα ; compare the value of 
righteous men for Sodom. But even if 
Peter contemplated this parallel it is quite 
subordinate to the main idea, in which 
(spirit) even to the spirits in prison he 
went and preached them thai disobeyed 
once upon a time when the patience of 
God was waiting in the days of Noah 
while the ark was being fitted out... . 
The spirits who disobeyed in the days of 
Noah are the sons of God described in 
Gen. vi. 1-4. But there as in the case of 
Sarah St. Peter depends on the current 
tradition in which the original myth has 
been modified and amplified. This de- 
pendence supplies an adequate explanation 
of the difficulties which have been found 
here and in ver. 21, provided that the 
plain statement of the preaching in Hades 
is not prejudged to be impossible. The 
important points in the tradition as given 
in the Book of Enoch (vi.-xvi. cf. Jubilees 
v.) are as follows: the angels who lusted 
after the daughters of men descended in 
the days of Jared as his name (Descent) 
shows. The children of this unlawful 
union were the Nephilim and the Eliud. 
They also taught men all evil arts so 
that they perished appealing to God for 
justice. At last Enoch was sent to pro- 
nounce the sentence of condemnation 
upon these watchers, who in terror be- 
sought him to present a petition to God 
on their behalf. God refused to grant 
them peace. They were spirits eternal 
and immortal who transgressed the line 
ef demarcation between men and angels 
and disobeyed the law that spiritual beings 
do not marry and beget children like men. 


IIETPOY A 


σχειν ἢ κακοποιοῦν 
Q c ~ 5 

ρὶ ἁμαρτιῶν ἔπαθεν 
θανατωθεὶς μὲν cap 


11. 


J 4 pat 
Tas: ὅτι και XS 


δίκαιος ὑπὲρ adikw ἵνα. 


kt ζωοποιηθεὶς δὲ 


Accordingly they are bound and their 
children slay one another leaving their 
disembodied spirits to propagate sin in 
the world even after it has been purged 
by the Flood. But Christians believed 
that Christ came to seek and to save the 
lost and the captives; all things are to be 
subjected to Him. So Peter supplements 
the tradition which he accepts. For him 
it was not merely important as connected 
with the only existing type of the Last 
Judgment or an alternative explanation 
of the origin and continuance of sin 
but also as the greatest proof of the 
complete victory of Christ over the most 
obstinate and worst of sinners.—év @ sc. 
πνεύματι: as a bodiless spirit in the 
period between the Passion (18) and the 
Resurrection-Ascension (22).—Kat, even 
to the typical rebels who had sinned past 
forgiveness according to pre-Christian 
notions.—tTots ἐν φυλακῇ πνεύμ- 
ασιν, the spirits in prison, ἴ.6., the 
angels of Gen. 1.6. who were identified 
with my spirit of Gen. vi. 3, and there- 
fore described as having been sent to the 
earth by God in one form of the legend 
(Jubilees, /.c.). The name contains also 
the point of their offending (Enoch sum- 
marised above) ; cf. 2 Peter ii. 4 ; *Jude 6; 
and the prophecy of Isa. lxi. 1 (which 
Jesus claimed, Luke iv. 8f.), κηρῦξαι 
αἰχμαλώτοις ἄφεσιν. These spirits were 
in ward when Christ preached to them in 
accordance with Gods sentence, bind 
them in the depths of the earth (Jub. 
v. 6).--ἐκήρυ ξεν = εὐηγγελίσατο, cf. 
Luke iv. 8. Before Christ came, they 
had not heard the Gospel of God’s Reign. 
Enoch’s mediation failed. But at Christ’s 
preaching they repented like the men of 
Nineveh ; for it is said that angels sub- 
jected themselves to Him (22, cf. ὕποτάσ- 
σεσθαι, throughout the Epistle.—é π e- 
ιθήσασίν wore, their historic dis- 
obedience or rebellion is latent in the nar- 
tative of Gen. vi. and expounded by 
Enoch > cf. ii. 7 £., ii. 1, iv. 57. In’ LX 
ἀπ. commonly = rebel (47). G π ε- 
ξεδέχετο . . - μακροθυμία, 
God’s long-suffering was waiting. The 
treading ἅπαξ ἐξεδέχετο is attractive, as. 
supplying a reference to the present 
period of waiting which precedes the 
second and final Judgment (Rom. ii. 4, 
ix. 22). The tradition lengthens the. 
period of πάρεσις (Rom. iii. 25); but. 





ΠΕΤΡΟΥ A 69 


18---21. 


σιν πορευθεὶς 19 
ἡ τοῦ Θῦ 20 


, 5 2 7 1 -. > lol , 
πνεύματι - ἐν w Kat! τοῖς ἐν φυλακῇ πνεύμα 
ἐκήρυ 

’ 
μακροθυμία 


ξεν ἀπειθήσασίν πο ε ὅτε ἀπεξεδέχετο 2 


ἐν ἡμέραις Νῶε κατα σκευαζομένης κειβώ 


του εἰς ἣν ὀλίγοι του τέστι ὀκτὼ ψυχαὶ διεσώθησαν δι᾽ ὕδα- 


ὃ καὶ ὑμᾶς ἀντίτυπο᾽ νῦν σώζει βάπτισμα οὐ σαρ- 21 


που ἀλλὰ συνειδήσε 


τος" 
Kos ἀπόθεσις ῥύ ὡς ἀγαθῆς ἐπερώτη 


1 Dr. Rendel Harris would restore ἑνώχ after ἐν ᾧ καὶ (%), supposing that a scribe 
has blundered ‘in dropping some repeated letters” (a case of haplography). See 
Side-Lights on New Testament Research, p. 208. 


2 Erasmus supposing an haplography read ἅπαξ ἐξεδέχετο for ἀπεξεδέχετο. 


St. Peter limits it by adding while the Ark 
was being fitted out in accordance with 
Gen. If Adam’s transgression be taken 
as the origin ot sin the long-suffering is 
still greater. The idea seems to be due 
to ἐνεθυμήθην, I reflected, of the LXX, 
which stands for the unworthy anthropo- 
morphism of the Hebrew I repented in 
Gen. vi. 6. Compare for language Jas. 
v. 7; Matt. xxiv. 37 f.; Luke xvii. 26 f.— 
εἰς ἣν, sc. entered and.—érAlyou, 
κτλ. St. Peter hints that here in the 
typical narrative is the basis of the 
disciple’s question, et ὀλίγοι οἱ σωζόμε- 
νοι (Luke xiii. 23).-τ-ὀκτὼ ψυχαί, so 
Gen. vii. 7; Ψ. = persons (of both sexes), 
cf. Acts ii. 41, etc. The usage occurs in 


Greek of all periods; so YH in He- 
brew and soul in English.—é8veo ὦθ η- 
σαν δι᾽ ὕδατος, were brought safe 
through water. Both local and instru- 
mental meanings of δί are contemplated. 
The former is an obvious summary of the 
whole narrative; cf. also διὰ τὸ ὕδωρ 
(Gen. vii. 7). The latter is implied in 
the statement. that the water increased 
and lifted up the ark (ib. 17 f.) ; though it 
fits better the antitype. So Josephus 
(Ant. L, iii. 2) says that “the ark was 
strong so that from no side was it worsted 
by the violence of the water and Noah with 
his household διασῴζεται ᾿. Peter lays 
stress on the water (rather than the ark as 
é.g., Heb. xi.) for the sake of the parallel 
with Baptism (Rom. vi. 3; cf. St. Paul’s 
application of the Passage of the Red 
Sea, 1 Cor. x. 1 ἢ). 

Ver. 21. Baptism is generally the 
antitype of the deliverance of Noah. 
Christians pass through water (in both 
senses) to salvation; in each microcosm 
are the sins which must be washed away 
and the remnant which is to be saved. 
Therefore the antitypical water saves us 
(6 = τὸ ὕδωρ > δί᾽ ὕδατος) being οὐ 
σαρκὸς, κιτιλ,; cf. Tit. iii. 5.--ββᾷ πτι- 
σμα, if not an interpolation explains 

VOL. V. 


6 avr. which corresponding to the (pre- 
existent) type (cf. Heb. ix. 24 the earthly 
temple is ἀντίτυπα τῶν ἀληθινῶν). The 
following definition by exclusion con- 
trasts Christian baptism with Jewish and 
pagan lustrations and also with the Deluge 
which was a removal of sin-fouled flesh 
from the sinners of old (iv. 6) ; the former 
affected the flesh and not the conscience 
(Heb. ix. 13 f.), the latter removed the 
flesh but not the spiritual defilement pro- 
ceeding from past sin. σαρκός and ovvet- 
δήσεως stand before their belongings for 
emphasis and not merely in accordance 
with prevalent custom. For ἀπόθεσις 
ῥύπον compare Isa. iv. 4 (sequel of the 
description of the daughters of Zion which 
is used above iii. 3), fehovah shall wash 
away their filth (τὸν ῥύπον : LXX chival- 
rously prefixes of the sons and). ἐπε- 
ρώτημα is explained by Oecumenius as 
meaning earnest, pledge as in Byzantine 
Greek law. Its use for the questions put 
to the candidate in the baptismal service 
(dost thou renounce . ..?) is probably 
due to St. Peter here. In ordinary Greek 
(Herodotus and Thucydides) it = question 
(ἐπ. having no force, as if implying 2 
second additional question arising out of 
the first). Here the noun corresponds to 
the verb as used in Isa. Ixv. 1, quoted by 
St. Paul in Rom. x. 20, ἐμφανὴς ἐγενόμην 
τοῖς ἐμὲ ph ἐπερωτῶσι = (1) a seeking, 
quest after God or (2) request addressed to 
God (supported by eis; cf. the formula 
ἔντευξις εἰς TO βασίλεως ὄνομα, a petition 
addressed to the king’s majesty). In 
the latter case Peter will still be thinking 
as above and below of the disobedient 
spirits who presented a petition (ἐρώτη- 
σις) to God inspired by an evil con- 
science (see Enoch summarised above). 
At any rate συνειδ. is probably subjective 
or possessive rather than objective geni- 
tive. The believer who comes to bap- 
tism has believed in Christ and repented 
of his past sins, renounces them and the 


70 


22 μα εἰς OV δί ἀναστάσε 
θεὶς εἰς 

IV. τσιῶν καὶ δυνάμε 
αὐ τὴν ἔννοιαν ὁπλίσα 

2 ἁμαρτίαις 4 
θελήματι OF τὸν ἐπί 
3 ἀρκετὸς 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ ἃ 


ws 10 XE ὅς ἐστιν ἐν Se 
οὐρανὸν ὑποταγέν 
ων Χῦ οὖν παθόντος 2 


εἰς τὸ μηκέτι ἀνθρώ 
λοιπὸν ἐν σαρκὶ Pro 
γὰρ ὁ παρεληλυθὼς 


111. 22. ὅν. 


ξιᾷ ©01 πορευ- 
δ᾽. δὰ > y > 
των αὐτῷ ἀγγέλων καὶ ἐξου- 
σαρκὶ ὃ καὶ ὑμεῖς τὴν 
θ . ἮΝ ς bY ‘ ’ 
σθε - ὅτι ὁ παθὼν σαρκὶ πέπαυται 
πων ἐπιθυμίαις ἀλλὰ 
σαι χρόνον" 


χρόνος ὁ τὸ βούλημα τῶ 


1 After θεοῦ the Vulgate adds degluttiens mortem ut vitae aeternae heredes efficia- 


mur. 


2The variant αποθανόντος for παθόντος is a simple case of erroneous transcrip- 


tion which does not affect the sense. 
ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν. 


Codex Alexandrinus adds the Christian gloss 


3 To σαρκὶ two secondary uncials prefix the preposition ἐν. 
4 For ἁμαρτίαις most manuscripts have ἁμαρτίας, 
5 After yap the secondary uncials supply ἡμῖν, and the first hand of Codex Sinai- 


ticus with many cursives ὑμῖν. 


6 The secondary uncials add τοῦ βίου to χρόνος and substitute θέλημα for βούλ- 


μα. 


spirits which prompted them and appeals 
to God for strength to carry out this re- 
nunciation in his daily life—é6? a@vagr. 
with σώζει ; compare 1 Cor. xv. 13-17. 

Ver. 22. Christ went into Heaven— 
and now is on God's right hand (Ps. cx. 
1)—when angels and authorities and 
powers had subjected themselves to Him 
in accordance with prophecy (Ps. viii. 7; 
of. Heb. ii. 8; 1 Cor. xv. 24 ff.). For 
the orders of angels see also Rom. viil. 
38; Eph. i, 21. Clearly they include 
the rebels of ver. 19 f. whom Jubilees 
calls the angels of the Lord (Jub. iv. 15) 
and Onkelos the sons of the mighty and 
their children (?) the giants. 

CHAPTER IV.—Ver. 1. Christ having 
died to flesh, arm yourselves with the 
same thought that (or because) he thai 
died hath ceased to 51:5.--παθόντος- 
σαρκί. Peter goes back to the start- 
ing point of iii. 18 in order to emphasise 
the import of the first step taken by 
Christ and His followers, apart now from 
the consequences. The new life implies 
death to the οἱά.---τὴν αὐτὴν ἔννοιαν. 
é. only occurs once elsewhere in N.T., 
Heb. iv. 12, τῶν ἐνθυμήσεων καὶ ἐννοιῶν 
καρδίας, but is common in LXX of Pro- 
verbs ; compare (e¢.g.) Prov. ii. 11, ἔννοια 
ὁσία (ἸΟ discernment) shall keep 
thee. Here it is the noun-equivalent of 
φρονεῖτε ὃ καὶ ἐν Χριστῷ (Phil. ii. τὴ. 
Christ’s thought (or purpose) which He 
had in dying is shared by the Christian : 
and it is defined by ὅτι, κιτ.λ.--δσπλί- 
σασθε, sc. for the fight with sin and 





sinners whom you have deserted.—é7t 
+ + + ἁμαρτίαις. This axiom is 
better taken as explaining the same 
thought than as motive for ὅπλ. St. 
Paul states it in other words, 6 yap ἄπο- 
θανὼν δεδικαίωται ἀπὸ τῆς ἁμαρτίας; 
compare the death-bed confession of the 
Jew, “Ο may my death be an atonement 
ior all the sins . . . of which I have been 
guilty against thee”. One dead—literally 
or spiritually—hath rest in respect of 
sins assumed or committed; so Heb. ix. 
28 insists that after His death Christ is 
χωρὶς ἁμαρτίας. πέπαυται echoes παυ- 
σάτω of iii. το. In the Greek Bible the 
perfect passive occurs only once (Exod. 
ix. 34) outside Isa. i.-xxxix., where it is 


used three times to render (cf. 
σαββατισμός, Heb. iv. 9). Te arive 
Gp. is analogous to that following ζῆν 
ἀποθανεῖν (παθεῖν) ; the v./. ἁμαρτίας 
is due to the common construction of 
TAU. 

Ver. 2. Christians who were baptised 
into Christ’s death and resurrection (Rom. 
vi. 2-11) are not taken out of the world at 
once (John xvii. 15); they have to live 
in the flesh but not to the flesh, because 
they have been born not of the will of the 
Slesh nor of man but of God (John i. 13). 
Their duty is to their new Father.—eis 
76... gives the result of ὅτι x.7.A. 
which must be achieved by, and is there- 
fore also the object of, the required orna- 
ment. 

Ver. 3. The use of the rare apkerds 
indicates the saying which St. Peter here 


I—5. 


ἐθνῶν κατειργάσθαι - 
ais οἰνοφλυγίαις κώ 
2 , 
ats ἐν ᾧ ξενίζονται 
τῆς ἀσωτίας ἀνάχυσι 


applies, sufficient unto the day [that is 
past] izs evil. Compare Ezek. xliv. 6, 
ἱκανούσθω ὑμῖν ἀπὸ πασῶν τῶν ἀνομιῶν 
ὑμῶν. The detailed description of the 
evil follows the traditional redaction of 
the simple picture of absorption in the 
ordinary concerns of life which Jesus is 
content to repeat (Matt. xxiv. 37, etc.). 
Eating, drinking, marrying were inter- 
preted in the worst sense to account for 
the visitation and become gluttony, 
drunkenness and all conceivable perver- 
sions of marriage; see Sap. xiv. 21-27, 
followed by Rom. i. 29, etc.—Trd... 
πεπορευμένους, from 2 Kings xvii. 
8,1 ἐπορεύθησαν τοῖς δικαιώμασιν τῶν 
ἐθνῶν. The construction is broken (for 
the will . .. to have been accomplished 
. .. for you walking) unless kat. be taken 
as if middle to wemop. as subject.— 
ageXyetats, acts of licentiousness 
(as in Polybius) ; so Sap. xiv. 26. Earlier 
of wanton violence arising out of drunk- 
enness (Demosthenes).—otvo@gAv γί- 
aus, wine-bibbings, Deut. xxi. 20, otvod- 


Avyet = ΚΦ: Noun occurs in Philo 
coupled with ἀπλήρωτοι ἐπίθυμίαι.--- 
κώμοις, revellings associated with 
alien rites, Sap. xiv. 26. For πότοις cf. 
ποτήριον δαιμόνων, 1 Cor. x. 14 ff.— 
ἀθεμίτοις εἰδωλολατρίαις, a 
Jew’s description of current Pagan cults, 
which were often illicit according to 
Roman law. For ἀ. οὔ. Actsx. 28, tis un- 
lawful for a Few to associate with a 
foreigner, and 2 Macc. vi. 5, vii. 1 (of swine 
flesh). 

Ver. 4. ἐν ᾧ, whereat, i.e. (i.) at 
your change of life (2 f.) explained below 
by μὴ συντρεχ-. .. . or (ii.) on 
which ground, because you lived as they 
did.—EevilLovrau, are surprised, as in 
ver. 12, where this use of £. (elsewhere in 
N.T. entertain, except Acts xvii. 20, 
ξενίζοντα) is explained by ὡς ξένου . .. 
συμβαίνοντος. Polybius has it in the 
same sense followed by dative, acc., διά 
with acc. and ἐπί with dative. Soin Jose- 
phus Adam was surprised (ξενιζόμενον) 
that the animals had mates and he none, 
Ant, i. 1, 2) and the making of garments 
surprised God (ib. 4).—ovvtpex dv- 
tv, from Ps. 1. 18, LXX, if thou sawest 
a thief, συνέτρεχες αὐτῷ, and with adul- 
terers thou didst set thy portion; where 


TETPOY A 


πεπορευμένους ἐν 
pots πότοις καὶ ἀθε 
μὴ συντρεχόντων 
βλασφημῦνταις οἱ 


71 


ἀσελγείαις ἐπίθυμι 
μίτοις εἰδωλολατρεί 
ὑμῶν εἰς τὴν αὐτὴν 4 
ἀποδώσουσι λόγον 5 


ΓΛ consent has been rendered as it 
rom “run. It thus corresponds to 


St. Paul’s συνευδοκεῖν (Rom. i. 32).— 
ἀσωτίας, profligacy. According to 
Aristotle a. is the excess of liberality, 
but is applied in complex sense to τοὺς 
ἀκρατεῖς καὶ εἰς ἀκολασίαν δαπανηρούς. 
Prodigality is in fact a destruction of one- 
self as well as one’s property (Eth. Nic., 
iv. 13).--ἀσελγείαις . . -. πότοις. 
Violence and lust are classed with 
drunkenness, which breeds and fosters 
them. 4. is wanton violence as well as 
licentiousness. So the classic Christian 
example of the word is exactly justified ; 
see Luke xv. 13, the Prodigal Son squan- 
dered his substance, living ἄσώτως.--- 
ἀνάχυσιν, excess, overflow, properly 
of water (Philo ii. 508 f., description of 
evolution of air from fire, water from 
air, land from water). In Strabo (iii. 1, 4, 
etc.) = estuary. St. Peter is still thinking 
of the narrative of the Deluge, which was - 
the fit punishment of an inundation of 
prodigality—BAaocdynpovvres, put 
last for emphasis and to pave the way 
for ver. 5 in accordance with the saying, 
for every idle word (cf. Rom. iii. 8). The 
abuse is directed against the apostate 
heathens and implies blasphemy in its 
technical sense as opposed to the giving 
glory to God (ii. 12). 

Ver. 5. ἀποδώσουσιν λόγον. 
will render account — if of their 
blasphemy, cf. Matt. xii. 36, if of their 
ἀσωτία (see note) cf. the steward of 
Luke xvi. 2.—r@ ἑτοίμως κρίνο- 
vv, 4¢., to Christ rather than to God 
(asi. 17). The Christians took over the 
Jewish doctrine that every man must 
give an account of his life (Rom. xiv. 10). 
As already Enoch (Ixix. 27 = John v. 22, 
27) taught that this judgment was dele- 
gated to Messiah. So St. Peter said at 
Caesarea this is he that hath been ap- 
pointed by God judge of living and dead 
(Acts x. 43). Compare Matt. xxv. 31 ff. 
for a more primitive and pictorial state- 
ment. The use of ἑτοίμως pro- 


bably represents “JIP\37 (see i. 5) 7.¢., 
the future judge; Greek readers would 


understand the imminent judge (cf. 
use of ἑτοίμως = ready, sure to come, 
Homer, Il., xviii. 96, etc.). The v./. 


72 


6 τῷ ἑτοίμως κρείνοντι 1 
καὶ νε 

7 πους σαρκὶ ζῶ 
ἤγγικεν > σωφρονήσα 

8 πρὸ πάντω 
9 ἀγάπη καλύπτει πλῆ 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ A 
κροῖς εὐηγγελίσθη ἵ 
σι δὲ κατὰ OV πνεύματι. 


τὴν εἰς ἑαυτοὺς ἀγάπη. 
Bos ἁμαρτιῶν - φιλόξε 


IV. 
- Ν a > A 
ζῶντας καὶ νεκροὺς εἰς τοῦτο γὰρ 
να κριθῶσι μὲν κατὰ ἀνθρώ- 
πάντων δὲ τὸ τέλος 
> Ν , > , 

τε οὖν καὶ νήψατε εἰς προσευχάς " 
ἐκτενῇ ἔχοντες ὅτι 

νοι εἰς ἀλλή- 


1 Codex Sinaiticus with the bulk of the manuscripts has ἔχοντι κρῖναι for κρίνοντι. 


ἑ. ἔχοντι κρῖναι softens the rugged 
original, 

Ver. 6. The judgment is imminent 
because all necessary preliminaries have 
been accomplished. There is no ground 
for the objection ‘‘perhaps the culprits 
have not heard the Gospel”. As regards 
the living, there is a brotherhood in the 
world witnessing for Christ in their lives 
and the missionaries have done their 
part. As regards the dead Christ de- 
scended into Hades to preach there and 
so was followed by His Apostles. And 
the object of this was that though the 
dead have been judged as all men are in 
respect of the flesh they might yet live as 
God lives in respect of the spirit.—eis 
τοῦτο, with a view to the final judg- 
ment or = ἵνα, x.t.\..—vekpots, to 
dead men generally, but probably as dis- 
tinct from the rebel spirits who were 
presumably immortal and could only be 
imprisoned. Oecumenius rightly con- 
demns the view, which adds in trespasses 
and sins or takes dead in a figurative 
sense, despite the authority of e.g., Augus- 
tine (Ep., 164, 88 1-18).—etdnyye- 
λίσθη, the Gospel was preached, the 
impersonal passive leaves the way open 
for the development of this belief accord- 
ing to which not Christ only but also the 
Apostles preached to the dead. Hermas, 
Sim., ix. 165-167; Cl. Al. Strom., vi. 
645f. So was provision made for those 
who died between the descent of Christ 
and the evangelisation of their own 
countries.—tva, κ. τ᾿ λ., that though 
they had been judged in respect of flesh as 
men are judged they might live in respect 
of spirit as God lives. The parallel be- 
tween the dead and Christ is exact (see 
iii, 20). Death is the judgment or sen- 
tence passed on all men (Ecclus. xiv. 17 
= Gen. ii. 17, iii. 19). Even Christians, 
who have died spiritually and ethically 
(Rom. viii. 10), can only hope wistfully to 
escape it (2 Cor. v. 2 ff.). But it is pre- 
liminary to the Last Judgment (Heb. ix. 
27), at which believers, who are quick- 
ened spiritually, cannot be condemned to 
the second death (Apoc. xx. 6). 


Ver. 7. But the end of all things and 
men has drawn nigh; Christians also 
must be ready, watch and pray, as Jesus 
taught in the parable of Mark xiii. 34-37 
(cf. xiv. 38). --σωφρονήσατε paral- 
lels ἄσελγ. ἐπιθυμίαις (ver. 3) cf. 4 Macc. 
i. 31, temperance ts restraint of lust. In 
Rom. xii. 3 St. Paul plays on the mean- 
ing of the component parts of σω-φρονεῖν, 
cf. eis σωτηρίαν ψυχῶν above.—v ή ψ- 
a τε, corresponds to οἰνοφλυγίαις κώμοις. 
πότοις (ver. 3); cf. i. 13, ν. 8. St. Paul 
also depends on parable of Luke xii. 42- 
46 in τ Thess. v. 6 ἢ.--εἰς προσευ- 
χάς, the paramount duty of Christians 
is prayer especially for the coming of the 
Lord (Apoc. xxii. 20; Luke xi. 2; cf. 
lll. 7)- 

We 8. πρὸ πάντων, St. Peter em- 
phasises the pre-eminent importance of 
love of man as much as St. John; ¢f.i. 22. 
—éavtovs put for ἀλλήλους in accord- 
ance with the saying thou shalt love thy 
neighbour as thyself as much as with the 
contemporary practice—8 Tt... ἅμα- 
ρτιῶν, quotation of Prov. x. 12, love 
hides all transgressions which was ad- 
duced by Jesus (Luke vii. 47). The plain 
sense of the aphorism has been evaded 
by the LXX (πάντας τοὺς μὴ φιλονει- 
κοῦντας καλύπτει φιλία) and Syriac 
translators substitutes shame for love. 
The currency of the true version is at- 
tested by Jas. v. 20, he that converted a 
sinner... καλύψει πλῆθος ἁμαρτιῶν. 

Ver. 9. Hospitality is the practical 
proof of this love; its practice was neces- 
sary to the cohesion of the scattered 
brotherhood as to the welfare of those 
whose duties ‘called them to travel. 
The inns were little better than brothels 
and Christians were commonly poor. 
Chrysostom cites the examples of Abra- 
ham and Lot (cf. Heb. xiii. 2). The 
united advocacy of this virtue was suc- 
cessful—so much so that the Didache has 
to provide against abuses such as Lucian 
depicts in the biography of Peregrinus 
κα Christian traveller shall not remain 
more than two or three days . . . if he 
wishes to settle... is unskilled andi 


6—I2. 


λους ἄνευ γογγυσμοῦ - ἕκαστος 


εἰς ἑαυτοὺς αὐτὸ δια 

χάριτος Θῦ- εἴ τις λαλεῖ 
νεῖ ὡς ἐξ ἴσχυος ἧς χο 
ὁ O§ διὰ ld 

ὥνας τῶν αἰώνων ἀμήν. 
opt” πυρώσει πρὸς πειρα 
will not work he is a Χριστέμπορος, 
makes his Christian profession his mer- 
chandise.”»—a AA Aovs, used despite 
ἑαυτούς above and below, perhaps because 
the recipients of hospitality belong neces- 
sarily to other Churches.—avev yoy- 
yvopov, St. Peter guards against the 
imperfection of even Christian human 
nature. Ecclus. xxix. 25-28 describes 
how a stranger who outstays his welcome 
is first set to menial tasks and then driven 
out. 

Vv. to f. supplement the foregoing 
directions for the inner life of the Church 
and rest partly on Rom. xii. 6 (with 
simpler classification of gifts), partly on 
the conception of disciples as stewards 
(Luke xii. 42) serving out rations in God’s 
house.—8takovovvrTes, in the widest 
sense (as διακονία in Acts vi. I, 4; 1 Cor. 
xii. 5) in accordance with the saying, 
the Son of Man came... to minister 
(Mark x. 45), which is interpreted here, 
as part of the pattern, by the addition of 
an object (only here and i. 12); cf. 2 
Cor. viii. 19, τῇ χάριτι . . - τῇ ϑιακον- 
ουμένῃ ὑφ᾽ Hpav.oikovdpor The 
title is applied to all and not only to the 
governors as by St. Paul (1 Cor. iv. 1; 
Tit. i. 7); compare the question of St. 
Peter which precedes the source (Luke 
san. 41 £.). 

Ver. 11 follows the primitive division 
of ministry into that of the word and 
that of tables (Acts vi. 2-4); compare 
prophecy and ministry (in narrower sense 
like διακονεῖ here) of Rom. xii. 6.— 
λαλεῖ covers all the speaking described 
in 1 Cor. xii. 8, 10, to one by means of the 
spirit hath been given a word of wisdom, 
etc. ... xiv. 6,26.—a@s5 λόγια θεοῦ 
(perhaps echoes κατὰ τὴν ἀναλογίαν of 
Rom. xii. 6) as being God’s oracles or as 
speaking God’s oracles. The Seer is the 
model for the Christian preacher: Num. 
Xxiv. 4, φησὶν ἀκούων λόγια θεοῦ. His 
message is the particular grace of God 
which he has to administer like the pro- 
phets and evangelists, i. 10-12. — 
διακονεῖ includes all forms of the 


TIETPOY A 


κονοῦντες ὡς καλοὶ 
ὡς λόγια OG" 
ρηγεῖ 6 OS: ἵνα ἐν πᾶσιν 
X@ ᾧ ἐστιν ἡ δόξα καὶ 
ἀγαπητοί, μὴ 

σμὸν ὑμῖν τεινομέ 


73 


καθὼς ἔλαβεν χάρισμα 10 
οἰκονόμοι ποικίλης 
εἴ τις διακο IT 


δοξάζηται 
τὸ κράτος εἰς τοὺς αἱ 
ξενίζεσθε τῇ ἐν 12 
vn ὡς ξενοῦ 


ministration of God’s gifts other than 
those of speech—primayily almsgiving, 
hospitality and the like—tva,x.7.A. A 
liturgical formula such as this is neces- 
sarily capable of many special meanings. 
—éymaotv may refer particularly to 
the gifts or their possessors—hardly to the 
Gentiles as Oec. suggests (Matt. v. 16)— 
but so to limit it would be a gratuitious in- 
justicetotheauthor. Thesaying ἐν τούτῳ 
ἐδοξάσθη ὁ πατήρ pov iva καρπὸν πολὺν 
φέρητε καὶ γενήσεσθε ἐμοὶ μαθηταί is 
sufficient to justify this appendix to the 
exhortation love one another in deed 
--διὰ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, through 
Yesus Christ through whom the spirit 
descended on each of you, Acts ii. 33, 
through whom you offer a sacrifice of 
praise (Heb. xiii. 15); cf. δοξαξέτω τὸν 
θεὸν ἐν ὀνόματι τούτῳ.---ὸ ... The in- 
sertion of ἐστιν changes the doxology to 
a statement of fact and thus supports the 
interpretation of @ as referring of the 
immediate antecedent ¥esus Christ. Al- 
ready He possesses the glory and the 
victory ; realising this His followers en- 
dure joyfully their present suffering and 
defeat. 

Ver. 12. ἀγαπητοί marks the be- 
ginning of the third division of the 
Epistle in which Peter having cleared 
the ground faces at last the pressing 
problem.—fEevileo Oe, be surprised, as 
in ver. 4.-τῇ ἐν ὑμῖν πυρώσει, 
the ordeal which is in your midst or 
rather in your hearts.—év ὑμῖν, cf. 
τὸ ἐν ὑμῖν ποίμνιον (v. τὴ but the test 
is internal—in what frame of mind will 
they meet it? Willthey regard it as a 
strange thing or as a share in Christ’s 
sufferings, part of the pattern ?— v p- 
ώσει. This conception of suffering as 
a trial not vindictive is stated in Jud. 
viii. 25, 27, ἐκείνους ἐπύρωσεν els éra- 
opov καρδίας αὐτῶν ; compare Zach. 
xiii. 19, πυρώσω αὐτοὺς ὡς πυροῦται 
ἀργύριον, Prov. xxvii. 21, χρυσῷ πύρωσις 
parallels but a man is tried .. . π. also 
occurs in the sense of blasting, Amos iv. 
9; Apoc. xviii. 9, 18. 


74 


13 ὑμῖν συμ 
παθήμασιν χαίρε 
14 αὐτοῦ 
Xd μακάριοι ὅτι 
ἀναπαύεται "2 μὴ γάρ 


15 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


Baivovtos* ἀλλὰ καθὸ 
τε ἵνα καὶ ἐν τῇ ἀποκα 
χαρῆτε ἀγαλλιώμενοι " 
τὸ τῆς δόξης ' καὶ τὸ τοῦ 
τις ὑμῶν πασχέτω 


IV, 


κοινωνεῖτε τοῖς TOU xt 
λύψει τῆς δόξης 
εἰ ὀνειδίζεσθε ἐν ὀνό ματι 
Θῦ πνεῦμα ἐφ᾽ ὑμᾶς 
ὡς φονεὺς ἢ κλέπτης 


1 After δόξης the first hand of Codex Sinaiticus with the consent of many manu- 


scripts adds καὶ τῆς δυνάμεως αὐτοῦ. 


4 At the end of the verse the secondary uncials add κατὰ μὲν αὐτοὺς βλασφημεῖ- 


ται κατὰ δὲ ὑμᾶς δοξάζεται. 


Ver. 13. καϑό, so far as, i.e., so far 
as your suffering is undeserved and for 
Christ's name.—kotvwvette.. - 
παθήμασιν, ye share the sufferings 
of the Messiah. The dative after x. 
usually denotes the partner; here the 
thing shared as in Rom. xv. 27; 1 Tim. 
v. 22; 2 John 11; and in LXX; Sap. vi. 
23; 3 Macc. iv. 1. This idea is ex- 
pressed even more Strongly by St. Paul 
ἀνταναπληρῶ τὰ ὑστερήματα τῶν θλί- 
Ψψεων τοῦ Χριστοῦ (Col. i. 24). It is 
derived from such sayings as the disciple 
is as his Master (Matt. x. 24 f.)—the sons 
of Zebedee must drink his cup, be bap- 
tised with his baptism (Mark x. 38 f.). 
To suffer in Christ’s name is to suffer as 
representing Christ and so to share His 
sufferings.—tva«.7.X., from Matt. v. 12, 
χαίρετε καὶ ἀγαλλιᾶσθε. But St. Peter 
postpones the exultation. St. James (v. 
10) follows Jesus in appealing to the 
pattern of the prophets. ἀποκαλύ- 
Wet, the final revelation represents an 


original wordplay ate on the quoted 


ἀγαλλιώμενοι = 3". 

Ver. 14. The Beautitude, μακάριοι 
- + » ὅταν ὀνειδίσωσιν ὑμᾶς ἕνεκεν ἐμοῦ 
is supported by prophecy which referred 
originally to the root of Jesse. Both are 
partially pataphrased for sake of clear- 
ness. For év ὀνόματι; cf. Mark ix. 41, 
ἐν ὀνόματι ὅτι Χριστοῦ ἔστε. For the re- 
proach cf. Heb. xiii. 13, let us come out 
to him bearing His reproach, with Ps. 
Ixxxix., so remember Lord the veproaches 
(ὀνειδισμῶν LXX) of thy servants.—6 Tt 
++-G@vamwavetat, quoted from a 
current Targum of Isa. xi. 1 f., a branch 


(x5: LXX, ἄνθος : Targ. Messiah) 
from his roots shall grow aud there shall 
rest upon him the spirit of Fehovan. An 
elaborate description of this spirit fol- 
lows, which Peter summarises by τὸ τῆς 
δόξης. The Glory is a name of God in 
the Targums (so John xii. 41 = Isa. vi. 


5; Onkelos has ‘SF NWP" for 9) and 


its use here is probably due to the juxta- 
position of Isa. xi. 10, his rest shall be 
glorious. It is not impossible that kat 
τοῦ θεοῦ is an insertion by first or later 
scribes for the benefit of Greek readers. 
Ver. 15. γάρ. I assume that you 
suffer in Christ’s name as representing 
Him and bearing only the reproach which 
attaches to it per se. The crimes of 
which slanderers had accused Christians 
are given in the order of probability and 
are selected as belonging to the pattern. 
Christ Himself was implicitly accused 
thereof by His persecutors and acquitted 
of each by independent witnesses, as the 
Gospels are at pains to show. He suf- 
fered the fate from which the murderer 
was preserved (Acts iii. 14) by the peti- 
tion of the Jews; shared it with thieves 
or brigands, being delivered up to the 
secular arm as a malefactor (John xviii. 
30). Such slanders the Christian must 
rebut for the credit of his Lord; that he 
must not be guilty of such crimes goes 
without saying —aAAoTprewiaxko- 
aos is distinguished from the preceding 
accusations by the insertion of ὡς ; it is 
also an addition to the pattern of Christ, 
unless stress be laid on the sneer, He 
saved others. The word was apparently 
coined to express the idea of the itinerant 
philosopher of whatever sect current 
among the unphilosophical. Epictetus 
defends the true Cynic against this very 
calumny; he is a messenger sent from 
Zeus to men to show them cones 
good and evil (Arrian, iii. 22, 23) . 
a spy of what is helpful and harmful to 
men ... he approaches all men, cares 
for all. (ib. 81)... neither meddler— 
aweptepyos—nor busybody is such an one; 
for he is not busy about alien things— 
τὰ ἀλλότρια TokvTpaypovet—when he 
inspects the actions and relations of 
mankind—érayv τὰ ἀνθρώπινα ἐπισκοπῇ 
(tb. 97). This zeal for the welfare of 
others was certainly the most obvious 
charge to bring against Christians, who 
indeed were not always content to 


I13—19. V.1. 


ἢ κακοποιὸς ἢ ὡς GN : λοτριεπίσκοπος " εἶ δὲ 


αἰσχυνέσϑω δοξαζέ 


‘ 
μὴ 
ὅτι ὃ και ρὸς τοῦ ἄρξασθαι τὸ 
Θῦ εἰ δὲ πρῶτον ἁ 
τῷ τοῦ Θῦ εὐαγγελίῳ - 
3 ‘ 
ἀσεβὴς 
χοντες κατὰ τὸ 


A c A ~ 
καὶ ἁμαρτωλὸς ποῦ 


σαν τὰς ψυχὰς ἐν a 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


τω δὲ τὸν OV ἐν τῷ dvd 

κρίμα ἀπὸ τοῦ οἴκου 

πὸ ἡμῶν τί τὸ τέλος 
» Ὁ: , , 

καὶ εἰ ὁ δίκαιος μόλις 

φανεῖται - ὥστε καὶ οἱ 
θέλημα τοῦ OF πιστῷ 
t 

γαθοποιΐᾳ. πρεσβυ 


75 


ὡς Χρειστιανὸς τό 

pate! τούτῳ 
τοῦ 17 
- > , 

τῶν ἀπειθούντων 

σώΐεται ὃ δὲ 18 

πάσ- 19 


κτιστῇ παρατιθέσθω 
τέρους οὖν ἐν ὑμῖν. 1 


1 The secondary uncials have μέρει for ὀνόματι. 


testify by good behaviour without word. 
St. Paul heard of some at Thessalonica, 
μηδὲν ἐργαζομένους ἀλλὰ περιεργαζο- 
μένους (2 Thess. iii. rr). Women gener- 
ally if unattached were prone to be not 
merely idle but meddlers speaking what 
they should not (τ Tim. v.13). SoSt. Peter 
(cf. Cor. x. 27) has emphasised the duty 
of all Christians—even of the wives of 
heathen husbands—to preach Christianity 
only by example and now deprecates 
their acquieScence in what some might 
reckon a title of honour. The fate of 
Socrates is the classical example of the 
suffering of such; and later one phil- 
osopher was scourged and another be- 
headed for denunciation of the alliance 
of Titus with Berenice (Dio Cassius, 
Ixvi. 15). Punishment of this offence 
would depend on the power of the other 
man concerned who, if not in authority, 
would naturally utilise mob-law like De- 
metrius (Acts xix.). 

Ver. 16. εἰ δὲ ὡς χριστιανὸς, 
if one suffers as a follower of Christ, in 
the name of Christ (14). See on Acts ix. 
26 and Introduction—p} aio yvvé- 
σ᾿ 8 echoes the saying, Whosoever shall 
be ashamed of me and my words of him 
also the Son of Man shall be ashamed 
when He cometh in the glory; so St. 
Paul says I suffer thus but am not 
ashamed (2 Tim. i. 12; cf. 8).---ὃ ο  α- 
ζέτω τὸν θεόν, by martyrdom if 
necessary, for this sense the phrase has 
᾿ acquired already in John xxi. 19.—év τῷ 
ὀνόματι τούτῳ = Mark ix, 41. 

Ver. 17. That Judgment begins at the 
House of God is a deduction from the 
vision of Ezek. ix. (cf. vii. 4, the καιρός 
has come); the slaughter of Israelites 
who are not marked with Tau, is or- 
dained by the Glory of the God of Israel ; 
the Lord said, ἀπὸ τῶν ἁγίων pov 
ἄρξασθε and the men began at (ἀπό) the 
elders who were within in the house. 
The new Israel has precedence like the 
old even in condemnation ; cf. Rom. ii. 


8 f., Tots... ἀπειθοῦσι τῇ ἀληθείᾳ 
«ον ὀργὴ ἐπὶ . . . ψυχὴν . . . Ἰουδαίου 
τε πρῶτον.--τῷ. . -.εὐαγγελίῳ, cf. 
Mark i. 14. The Gospel or Word, which 
God spake in a Son, succeeds to the law 
as the expression of the will against 
which all but the remnant (Ez. /.c.) rebel. 

Ver. 18. To the summary excerpt 
from Ezekiel Peter appends the Septu- 
agint version of Prov. xi. 31, which is 
followed by the Syriac and partially by 
the Targum: The original—according 
to the Masoretic text—is Behold or if 
the righteous will be punished on the 
earth : how much more the wicked and the 
sinner. The Greek, which probably re- 
presents asdifferent Hebrew text, is more 
apt to his purpose and to the teaching of 
Jesus, whiéh provoked the question, Who 
then can be saved (Mark x. 24-26). 

Ver. 19. So let even those who suffer 
in accordance with the will of God with 
a faithful Creator deposit their souls in 
well-doing. The Christian must still fol- 
low the pattern. It is God’s will that he 
share Christ’s sufferings in whatever 
degree; let him in this also copy Christ, 
who said, Father into thy hands I com- 
mit my spirit (Luke xxiii. 46 = Ps, xxxi. 
6) and bade His disciples lose their souls 
that they might find them unto life 
eternal. With this teachiny Peter com- 
bines that of the Psalmist which is as- 
sumed by Jesus (Matt. vi. 25 ff.), Fehovah 
knows His creature. He the God of 


faithfulness (ΩΝ bys, Sry 7.6) 15 
the faithful Creator to whom the soul 
He gave and redeemed (Ps. /.c.) may 
confidently return. 

CuHaPreR V.—Ver.1. οὖν, therefore 
—since your suffering is according to 
God’s will and calls only for the normal 
self-devotion, which Christ required of 
His disciples—go on with the duties of 
the station of life in which you are called. 
-πρεσβυτέρους, not merely older 
men as contrasted with younger (ver. 5), 


76 


παρακαλῶ ὁ συμπρε 
παθημά των ὃ 
2 δόξης κοινωνὸς ποι 
ἀναγκαστῶς ἀλλὰ ἑ 


. 
but elders, such as had been appointed by 
Paul and Barnabas in the Churches of 
Southern Asia (Acts xiv. 23). The col- 
lective τῶν κλήρων (ver. 3) and the ex- 
hortation, shepherd the flock (ver. 2) prove 
that they are the official heads of the 
communities addressed. Similarly St. 
Paul bade the elders of the Church (Acts 
xx. 17) at Ephesus take heed to them- 
selves and to all the flock in which the 
Holy Spirit appointed you overseers. The 
use of the term in direct address here 
carries with it a suggestion of the natural 
meaning of the word and perhaps also of 
the early technical sense, one of the first 
generation of Christians. Both Jews and 
Gentiles were familiar with the title 
which was naturally conferred upon 
those who were qualified in point of 
years; the youthful Timothy was a 
marked exception to the general rule 
(i Tim. iv. 12).—é@v ὑμῖν. Peter does 
not address them as mere officials, your 
elders, but prefers a vaguer form of ex- 


pression, elders who are among you (Ze 


τὸ ἐν ὑμῖν ποίμνιον, which also evades 
any impairing of the principle, ye are 
Christ's—o συμπρεσβύτερος .-- 
κοινωνός. This self-designation justi- 
fies Peter’s right to exhort them. He is 
elder like them, in all senses of the word. 
If their sufferings occupy their mind, he 
was witness of the sufferings of Christ ; 
of his own, if any, he does not speak. 
He has invited them to dwell rather on 
the thought of the future glory and this 
he is confident of sharing—padptrus 
..-«. παθημάτων. Such experience 
was the essential qualification ot an 
Apostle in the strict sense; only those 
who were companions of the Twelve in 
all the time from Fohn’s baptism to the 
Assumption or at least witnesses of the 
Resurrection (Acts i. 22) were eligible; as 
Jesus said, the Paraclete shall testify and 
do you testify because ye are with Me 
from the beginning (John xv. 27). That 
he speaks of the sufferings and not of the 
resurrection which made the sufferer 
Messiah, is due partly to the circum- 
stances of his readers, partly to his own 
experience. For him these sufferings had 
once overshadowed the glory; he could 
sympathise with those oppressed by per- 
secution and reproach, who understood 
now, as little as he then, that it was all part 


WETPOY A 


καὶ τῆς μελλού 
μάνατε τὸ ἐν ὑμῖν 
κουσίως μὴ δὲ αἴσχρο 


Υ. 


σβύτερος καὶ μάρτυς τῶν τοῦ Χῦ 


σης ἀποκαλύπτεσθαι 
ποίμνιον τοῦ Θῦ μὴ 
κερδῶς ἀλλὰ 


of the sufferings of the Messiah. He had 
witnessed but at the last test refused to 
share them.—o...kouiv@vos. Peter 
will share the future glory which Christ 
already enjoys for it was said to him, 
Thou shalt follow afterward (John xiii. 
36). St. Paul has the same idea in a 
gnomic form, εἴπερ συνπάσχομεν iva καὶ 
συνδοξασθῶμεν (Rom. viii. 17; cf. 2 Cor. 
iv. 10) which presupposes familiarity with 
the teaching of the risen Jesus rhat the 
Christ must suffer and so enter into His 
glory, Luke xxiv. 46; cf. i. 5, 13, iv. 13. 

Ver. 2. The command laid upon St. 
Peter, shepherd my sheep (John xxi. 19) 
became the charge delivered to succeed- 
ing elders (v. Acts xx. 28) and a familiar 
description of the Christian pastor (¢.g., 
1 Cor. ix. 7) who must copy the good 
Shepherd who obeyed where His prede- 
cessors fell short (Ez. χχχὶν.).- --τ ὸ ἐν 
ὑμῖν ποίμνιον τοῦ θεοῦ. Chris- 
tendom is God’s flock among you—not 
yours but God’s.—_avaykaoT@s. As 
a matter of constraint contrasted with 
ἑκουσίως, willingly—not as pressed men 
but as volunteers. In times of persecu- 
tion lukewarm elders might well regret 
their prominence; hence the need for 
the aphorism if any aspire to oversight 
he desiveth a noble work (τ Tim. iii. 1). 
So of gifts of money St. Paul requires 
that they be μὴ ἐξ ἀνάγκης (2 Cor. ix. 7). 
It is possible that St. Paul’s words, 
ἀνάγκη μοι ἐπικεῖται (1 Cor. ix. 16) had 
been wrested.—atoyxponxepSas. If 
the work be voluntarily undertaken, the 
worker has a reward according to St. 
Paul (τ Cor. ix. 16 ἢ). Base gainers are 
those who wish to make gain whence they 
ought not (Aristotle, Nic. Eth., v. 1, 43).— 
προθύμως. The adverb occurs in 2 
Chron. xxix. 34, LXX, where the Levites 
eagerly purified themselves; Heb. the 
Levites upright of heartto . . . The verb 
προθυμεῖν is used in Chron. to render 


315 offer freewill offerings. 

Ver 3. Application of the saying, the 
veputed rulers of the nations lord it (κατα- 
κυριεύουσιν) over them .. . not so among 
you ; but whosoever would be great among 
you he shall be your servant .. . for the 
Son of Man came... to serve (Mark x. 
42 [ἡ.--τκτῶν κλήρων, the lots, ΐ.6., 
the portions of the new Israel who fall to 


2—6, 


pos! Kal φανερωθέν 
τινον τῆς δόξης στέ 


προθύ 

τὸν Gpapa 

ὑποτάγητε πρε 
νοφροσύνην ἐγκομ 


- A 
τάσ σεται ταπεινοῖς δὲ 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥΑ 


σβυτέροις - πάντες δὲ 
βώσασθε 2 ὅτι OF Ste 
δίδωσιν χάριν: ταπει 


77 


τος τοῦ ἀρχιποίμενος κομιεῖσθε 4 


φανον - ὁμοίως ved 
ἀλλήλοις τὴν τάπει 


τεροι 5 


ρηφάνοις ἀντι- 
νώθητε 6 


1Codex Vaticanus is alone in omitting verse 3, μηδ᾽ ὡς κατακυριεύοντες τῶν 
κλήρων ἀλλὰ τύποι γινόμενοι τοῦ ποιμνίου. 
ΞΈΟΙ the unfamiliar ἐγκομβώσασθε two cursives read ἐγκολπίσασθε, whence 


insinuate of the Vulgate. 


your care as Israel fell to that of Jehovah 
(Deut. ix. 29, οὗτοι λαός σου καὶ κλῆρός 
gov). The meaning is determined by 
the corresponding τοῦ ποιμνίου and sup- 
ported by the use of προσεκληρώθησαν 
weve made an additional portion in Acts 
xvii. 4. So itis said of God’s servant that 
He κληρονομήσει πολλούς (Isa. 1111. 12). 
The Vulgate has dominantes in cleris, 
and Oecumenius following the usage of 
his time explains the phrase likewise as 
equivalent to τὸ ἱερὸν σύστημα, 2.¢., 
the inferior clergy.— Tumour. yervop- 
€VOl, ἴ.6., aS servants according to Mark 
5. 61. & hess.i. 7; 1, Tim. iv. 12. 

Ver. 4. φανερωθέντος τοῦ 
ἀρχιποίμενος, at the manifestation 
of the chief Shepherd, i.e., Christ. ἀρχι- 
ποίμην is the equivalent of ὃ ποίμην ὃ 
μέγας of Heb. xiii. 20, being formed on the 


analogy of ἀρχιερεύς = 54979 73 5 
else it occurs only as Symmachus’ render- 
ing of 72 (LXX, νωκηδ) in 2 Kings 
iii. 4 and in a papyrus. Cf. appeal to 
Jehovah, ὁ ποιμαίνων τὸν ᾿Ισραὴλ . - - 
ἐμφάνηθι of Ps. ΙΧχχ. 1.—rév... 
στέφανον = the crown of life which 
He promised (Jas. i. 12). The metaphor 
is probably derived from the wreath of 
fading flowers presented to the victor in 
the games (cf. ἀμαράντινον) ; but it may 
also be due to the conception of the 
future age as a banquet, at which the 
guests were crowned with garlands (Sap. 
il. 8, στεψώμεθα ῥόδων κάλυξιν πρὶν ἢ 
βαρανθῆναι). See on i. 4. 

Ver. 5. νεώτεροι, the younger 
members of each Church were perhaps 
more or less formally banded together on 
the model of the σύνοδοι τῶν νέων, which 
are mentioned in inscriptions as existing 
distinct from the Ephebi in Greek cities, 
especially in Asia Minor (Ziebarth Die 
Griechische Vereine, 111-115). Compare 
the modern Guilds and Associations of 
Young Men. In 1 Tim. iv. 1, these 
matural divisions of elders and youngers 


are also recognised.—_mwavres 52... 
Elders must serve ; youngers  sub- 
mit. May all be lowly-minded towards 
one another—there is no need to add 
detailed commands. —éyrxopBPaca- 
σθε is explained by Oecumenius as 
ἐνειλήσασθε περιβάλεσθε (wrap your- 
selves in, put round you), so the com- 
mand corresponds to ἐνδύσασθε .. . 
ταπεινοφροσύνην of Col. iii. 12. But the 
choice of this unique word must have 
some justification in associations which 
can only be reconstructed by conjecture. 
The lexicographers (Hesychius, Sindas, 
etc.) give κόμβος κόσυμβος and ἐγκόμ.- 
Bopa as synonyms. Pollux explains 
ἐγκομβ. as the apron worn by slaves to 
protect their tunic; so Longus, Pasto- 
valia, ii. 35 f., in ‘‘casting his apron, 
naked he started to run like a fawn”’. 
Photius (Epistle 156) takes George Metro- 
politan of Nicomedia to task for his sug- 
gestion that it was a barbarous word: 
“You ought to have remembered Epi- 
charmus and _ Apollodorus the 
former uses it frequently and the latter 
in the ‘ Runaway’ (a comedy) says τὴν 
ἐπωμίαν πτύξασα διπλῆν ἄνωθεν ἀνεκομ.- 
Boodpny.” But the LXX of Isa. iii. 18 
has τοὺς κοσύμβους = front-bands and 
Symmachus τὰ ἐγκομβώματα in ver. 20 
for bands or sashes. Peter is therefore 
probably indebted again to this passage 
and says gird yourselves with the humility 
which is the proper ornament of women. 
If the word be taken in this sense a 
reference to John xiii. 4 ff., Taking a 
napkin He girded Himself, may be reason- 
ably assumed. —@e6s...xadptv= 
Prov. iii. 34, LXX (θεός being put for 
κύριος, which to a Christian reader meant 
Christ); the Hebrew text gives scoffers 
he scoffs at but to the humble he shows 
favour. The same quotation 1s em- 
ployed in similar context by St. James 
(iv. 6); the devil (see below) is the 
typical scoffer. 

Ver.6. ταπεινώθητε οὖν echoes 
the exhortation and its accompanied 


78 


οὖν ὑπὸ τὴ 
ἢ καιρῷ - πᾶσαν τὴν μέ 
ὃ ὅτι 
δικος Spa 
9 ζητῶν καταπιεῖν ᾧ 
αὐτὰ τῶν παθηματω᾽ 


IO ἐπιτε 


scripture in ver. 5—obey in order that the 
promise (Luke xiv. 11) may be fulfilled 
for you, he that humbleth himself shall 
be exalted (sc. by God). So too St. James, 
subject yourselves therefore to God (iv. 7). 
--τὴν κραταιὰν χεῖρα. God's 
mighty hand is a common O.T. expres- 
sion; see Exod. iii. 19, etc. for con- 
nexion with deliverance and especially 
Ez. xx. 33 f., ἐν χειρὶ κραταιᾷ kal... 
ἐν θυμῷ κεχυμένῳ βασιλεύσω ἐφ᾽ ὑμᾶς. 

Ver. 7. τὴν μέριμναν - -.- αὖ- 
τόν comes from Ps. lv. 12, ἐπίριψον ἐπὶ 
Κύριον τὴν μέριμνάν σου, which is the 
source of part of the Sermon on the 
Mount (Matt. vi. 25 ff.).—6Te... 
ὑμῶν substituted for καὶ αὐτός σε δια- 
θρέψει of Ps. lic. in accordance with 
Jesus’ amplification and application of 
the metaphor. God cares for His flock 
as the hireling shepherd does not (οὐ 
μέλει αὐτῷ περὶ τῶν προβάτων, John 
x. 13). 

Ver. 8. νήψατε γρηγορήσατε, 
cf. i. 13, iv. 7. So St. Paul, γρηγορῶμεν 
καὶ νήφωμεν . . - ἡμέρας ὄντες νήφωμεν 
(x Thess. v. 6, 8) drawing upon the com- 
mon source in the Parables of the House- 
holder and Burglar, etc. (Matt. xxiv. 
42 ff.) which set forth the sudden com- 
ing of the Kingdom.—6 ἀντίδικος 
ὑμῶν διάβολος, your adversary, 
Satan—a. (properly adversary in law suit) 
is used in the general sense of enemy in 
LXX. Of the description of Satan, as a 
roaring lion comes from Ps. xxii. 14, ὡς 
λέων ὁ ἁρπάζων καὶ ὠρυόμενος ; walketh 
from Jobi. 7, where Satan (6 διάβολος 
LXX, Zarav, Aq.) περιελθὼν τὴν γῆν καὶ 
ἐμπεριπατήσας τὴν ὑπ᾽ οὐρανὸν πάρ- 
εἰμι; Seeking to devour identifies him with 
Hades the lord of death; cf. Prov. i. 12, 
where the wicked say of the righteous 
man, καταπίωμεν αὐτὸν ὥσπερ Gdns 
ζῶντα. The present sufferings of the 
Christians are his handiwork as much as 
the sufferings of Jesus (1 Cor. ii. 6, 8) and 
of Job. 

Ver.9. @ ἀντίστητε. St. James 
adds the same exhortation to his quota- 
tion of Prov. The connexion is not 


DETPOY A 


κραταιὰν χεῖρα τοῦ OG 
ριμναν ὑμῶν ἐπιρεί 
5 ~ . Se a 
αὐτῷ μέλει πέρὶ ὑμῶ 
διάβολος ὡς λέων ὦ 
ἀντιστῆτε στερεοὶ 


λεῖσθε- ὁ δὲ Θὲ πάσης 


3 
εν 


ἵνα ὑμᾶς ὑψώσῃ 
>> Cee 
ψαντες em auToV 
, , ὩΣ , 
νήψατε γρηγορησα τε ὃ ἄντι- 
ρυόμενος περιπατεῖ 
- , > , a 
TH πίστει εἰδότες τὰ 


ἀδελφότητι 


~ 5» ~ , ε a 
TH ἐν TO κόσμῳ ὑμῶ 
, id , ες - 
χάριτος 6 καλέσας U pas 


obvious but is perhaps due to the tradi- 
tional exposition of = ὑπερηφάνοις 


as referring to the Devil and his children. 
As God ranges Himself against scoffers, 
so must Christians resist the Devil who 
is working with their slanderous tempers. 
Oecumenius and Cramer’s Catena both 
appeal to an extract from Justin’s book 
against Marcion (?) which is preserved 
in Irenzus and quoted by Eusebius. 
The main point of the passage is that 
before Christ came the devil did not dare 
to blaspheme against God, for the pro- 
phecies of his punishment were enig- 
matic; but Christ proclaimed it plainly 
and so he lost all hope and goes about 
eager to drag down all to his own des- 
truction.—_oTepeot τῇ πίστει, rock 
like in your faith, abbreviation of ἐπι- 
μένετε τῇ πίστει τεθεμελιωμένοι καὶ 
ἑδραῖοι, Col. i. 23; cf. τὸ στερέωμα τῆς 
εἰς Χριστὸν πίστεως, Col. ii. 5 and Acts 
XVi. 5, GL. « - ἐκκλησίαι ἐστερεοῦντο TH 
πιστει. The metaphorical use of ot. in 
a good sense is not common. Peter 
perhaps thinks of the στερεὰ πέτρα 
(9x) of Isa. li. r and warns them against 
his own failing —eitSéres... ἐπι- 
τελεῖσθαι. The rendering (first sug- 
gested by Hoffmann) knowing how to 
pay (that you are paying) the same tax of 
sufferings as the brotherhood in the world 
is paying seems preferable to the com- 
mon knowing that the same kinds of 
sufferings are being accomplished for (by) 

. it assumes the proper idiomatic force 
of ἐπιτελεῖσθαι and accounts for τὰ αὐτά 
(sc. τέλη) followed by the genitive. 
Xenophon who is a good authority for 
Common Greek uses é thus twice:— 
Mem. iv. 8. 8, “but if I shall live longer 
perhaps it will be necessary to pay the 
penalties of old age (τὰ τοῦ γήρως ém- 
τελεῖσθαι) and to see and hear worse 
.. .” Apol, 33 nor did he turn effeminate 
at death but cheerfully welcomed it and 
paid the penalty (ἐπετελέσατο). For the 
dative with τὰ αὐτά same as, cf. τ Cor, xi. 
5, ἕν kal TO αὐτὸ τῇ ἐξυρημένῃ- 

Ver. το. Your adversary assails you, 


η-- 12. 


εἰς τὴν αἰώνιον 
, 
τὸς καταρτίσει στηρί 


τοὺς αἱ ὥνας ἀμήν. διὰ Cr 


ἀδελφοῦ ὡς λογίζο 


ἐπι μαρτυρῶν ταύτην 
but God has called you to His eternal 
giory; first for a little you must suffer, 
His grace will supply all your needs. 
Ver. g is practically a parenthesis; 6 
θεός stands over against ὁ ἀντίδικος (ver. 
8) as δέ shows.—6 καλέσας, for the 
promise of sustenance implied in the call- 
ing; cf. x Thess. v. 23 f.; 1 Cor. i. 8 f— 
ἐν Χριστῷ goes with 6... δόξαν; 
God called them in Christ and only as 
they are in Christ can they enter the 
glory; cf. 2 Cor. v. 17-19, et τις ἐν 
Χριστῷ καινὴ κτίσις . . . θεὸς ἦν ἐν 
Χριστῷ κόσμον καταλλάσσων ἑαυτῷ.-.--- 
ὀλίγον παθόντας, after you have 
suffered for a little while. The same 
contrast between temporary affliction and 
the eternal glory is drawn by St. Paul in 
2 Cor. iv. 17, τὸ παραυτίκα ἐλαφρὸν τῆς 
θλίψεως ... αἰώνιον βάρος δόξης κατερ- 
γάζεται, where in addition to the anti- 
thesis between eternal glory and tempor- 
ary suffering the weight of glory (play on 


meanings of root 55) is opposed to 


the lightness of tribulation.—atrés has 
the force of πιστὸς ὁ καλῶν (1 Thess. 
v. 24). --καταρτίσει, shall perfect. 
When Simon and Andrew were called to 
leave their fishing and become fishers of 
men James and John were themselves 
also in a boat mending—kataprifovras— 
their nets (Mark i. 16-19). The process 
was equally necessary in their new fish- 
ing and the word was naturally applied 
to the mending of the Churches or indi- 
vidual Christians who by their good be- 
haviour must catch men (see ¢.g., 1 Cor. 
i. 10), Only God can fully achieve this 
mending of all shortcomings; cf. Heb. 
xiii. 21.—oTtyptéer, shall confirm; cf. 
2 Thess. ii. 17, etc.; when the Kingdom 
of Heaven was stormed the stormers 
needed confirmation (Acts xviii. 23). 
This was the peculiar work assigned to 
St. Peter—thou having converted con- 
jirm—oripicov—the brethren (Luke xxii. 
32).--σθενώσει is only apparently 
unique, being equivalent to ἐνισχύσει or 
δυναμώσει (Hesychius) cf. Col. i. τι, ἐν 
πάσῃ δυνάμει δυναμώμενοι κατὰ τὸ κρά- 
τος τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ and Heb. xi. 34, 
ἐδυναμώθησαν ἀπὸ ἀσθενείας (parallel to 
ὀλίγον παθ. above). 

Ver. 11. Liturgical formula, adapted 


TIETPOY A 


αὐτοῦ δόξαν ἐν τῷ XG 
fer σθενώσει atta 


μαι δί ὀλίγων ἔγραψα 
εἶναι ἀληθῆ χάριν τοῦ 


79 


ὀλίγον παθόντας ad 
τὸ κράτος εἰς II 


βανοῦ ὑμῖν τοῦ πιστοῦ 12 


παρακαλῶν καὶ 
Θῦ εἰς ἣν 


in iv. 11 (ἐστιν), which occurs in 1 Tim. 
vi. 16; John 25; Apoc. i. 6; v. 13. 

Vv. 12-14. Postscript in St. Peter’s 
own handwriting, like Gal. vi. 11-18 
(ἴδετε πηλίκοις ὑμῖν γράμμασιν ἔγραψα 
τῇ ἐμῇ χειρί); 2 Thess. iii, 17 f. (6 
ἀσπασμὸς τῇ ἐμῇ χειρὶ Παύλου).--διὰ 
Σιλουανοῦ, by the hand of my scribe 
S.; so Ignatius writes διὰ Buppov to the 
Philadelphians (xi. 2) and the Smyrnaeans 
(xii. 1), but wishes to keep him with himself 
(Eph. 11. τ). That S. was also the bearer 
of the Epistle is indicated by the recom- 
mendation which follows. There does 
not seem to be any good reason for re- 
fusing to identify this S. with the com- 
panion of St. Paul and Timothy who 
wrote with them to the Church of Thessa- 
lonica and preached with them at Corinth 
(2 Cor. i. 19).— Tot πιστοῦ ἀδελ- 
pov ὡς λογίζομαι. One main 
object of the postscript is to supply S. 
with a brief commendation. He is pre- 
sumably the appointed messenger who 
will supplement the letter with detailed 
application of its general teaching and 
information about the affairs of the writer. 
So St. Paul’s Encyclical ends with that 
ye may know my circumstances how I 
fare Tychicus the beloved brother and 
faithful minister in the Lord shall make 
known all things to you (Eph. vi. 21 f.). 
S. was known probably to some of the 
Churches as St. Paul’s companion : in case 
he was unknown to any, St. Peter adds 
his own certificate. For this use of 
λογίζομαι compare 1 Cor. iv. 1, οὕτως 
ἡμᾶς λογιζέσθω ἄνθρωπος; 2 Cor. xi. 5, 
λογίζομαι yap μηδὲν ὑστερηκέναι τῶν 
ὑπερλίαν ἀποστόλων.--παρακαλῶν 
.««θεοῦ, motive and subject of the 
Epistle. St. Peter wrote exhorting as he 
said I exhort you (ii. 11, v. 1) and the 
general content of his exhortation may 
be given by the subordinate clause which 
follows: “That you stand in the grace, 
which I bear witness is truly God’s 
grace’’, The acquired sense of the verb 


comfort (LXX for ὉΠ) is not directly 
contemplated. The Epistle is a λόγος 
παρακλήσεως in the sense of ὁ wapa- 
καλῶν ἐν τῇ παρακλήσει, Rom, xii. 8.— 
ἐπιμαρτυρῶν, testifying to... not 
... in addition. The verb does not 


80 


13 στῆτε" 
14 Μᾶρκος 6 υἱός μου" 


γάπης - εἰρήνη ὑμῖν 


occur elsewhere in O.T. (LXX has ἐπι- 
μαρτύρομαι) or N.T.; but Heb. ii. 4 has 
the compound συνεπιμαρτυροῦντος τοῦ 
θεοῦ.--ταύτην .- - - θεοῦ, that this is 
true grace of God, i.e., the grace—in the 
widest sense of the word which is theirs 
(i. 10) which God gives to the humble 
(v. 5). St. Peter was witness of the 
sufferings of Christ which they now share ; 
he witnesses from his experience that the 
grace which they possess is truly God’s 
grace, though sufferings are a passing 
incident of their sojourn nere.—ets ἣν 
στῆ τε, paraenetic summary of τὴν προ- 
σαγωγὴν ἐσχήκαμεν εἰς τὴν χάριν ταύτην 
ἐν ἦ ἑστήκαμεν (Rom. v. 2), from which 
the easier reading ἐστήκατε is derived.— 
ἣ -«-«-συνεκλεκτή. As the co-elder 
exhorts the elders so the co-elect (woman) 
greets the elect sojourners (i. τὴ. The 
early addition of Church represents the 
natural interpretation of the word, which 
indeed expresses the latent significance of 
ἐκ-κλησία, the called out, compare St. 
Paul’s use of 4 ἐκλογή in Rom. xi. 7. In 
ν. I ff. Peter addresses bodies rather than 
individuals and in v. 9 he uses a collec- 
tive term embracing the whole of Chris- 
tendom. Accordingly the woman in ques- 
tion is naturally taken to mean the 
Church—and not any individual (see on 
Μᾶρκος). Compare the woman of Apoc, 
xii. 1 f. who is Israel—a fragment which 
presupposes the mystical interpretation of 
Canticles (see Cant. vi. 10) and generally 
the conception of Israel as the bride of 
Jehovah, which St. Paul appropriated, as 
complement of the Parables of the Mar- 
riage Feast, etc., and applied to the 
Church in Corinth (2 Cor. xi. 2). So in 
Hermas’ Visions the Church appears as a 
woman, ἐν Βαβυλῶνι, in Rome, ac- 
cording to the Apocalyptic Code, the use 
of which was not merely a safeguard but 
also a password. Compare Apoc. xvii. 5, 
on the forehead of the woman was written 
a mystery, “ Babylon the great,” xiv. 8, 
xvi. 10, xvili.2; Apoc. Baruch, xi. 1. So 
Papias reports a tradition (“they say”) 
that Peter composed his first Epistle in 
Rome itself and signifies this by calling 
the city allegorically Babylon. The 
point of the allegory is that Rome was 
becoming the oppressor of the new (and 


IIETPOY A 


ἀσπάζεται ὑμᾶς ἢ ἔ 
ἀσπάσασθε ἀλλή 


Vv. I3—I4. 


Βαβυλῶνι συνεκλε κτὴ καὶ 


λους ἐν φιλήματι a 
πᾶσι τοῖς ἐν Χῷ. 


old) Israel, not that it was the centre 
of the world (Oec.). Literal interpreta- 
tions (i.) Babylon, (ii.) Babylon in Egypt 
are modern.—_MG@pkKos ὁ υἱός pov. 
Oecumenius interprets son of spiritual 
relationship and adds noting that some 
have dared to say that M. was the fleshly 
son of St. Peter on the strength of the 
narrative of Acts xii. where P. is repre- 
sented as rushing to the house of the 
mother of John M. as if he were return- 
ing to his own house and lawful spouse. 
So Bengel, “ Céelecta sic coniugem suam 
appellare videtur; cf. iii. 7, Erat enim 
soror; 1 Cor. ix. 5, Et congruit mentio 
Jjilit Marci”. But granting that Petro- 
nilla (?) was missionary and martyr and 
that Peter may well have had a son— 
though Christian tradition is silent with 
regard to him—what have they to do 
sending greetings to the Churches of 
Asia Minor in this Encyclical ? 

Ver. 14. φιλήματι ἀγάπης. 
So St. Paul concludes 1 Thess. with 
greet all the brethren with an holy kiss 
(v. 26; cf. τ Cor. xvi. 20; 2 Cor. xiii. 12; 
Rom. xvi. 16). “ Hence,” says Origen, 
‘the custom was handed down to the 
Churches that after prayers (so Justin 
Apol., i. 65) the brethren should welcome 
one another with a kiss.’”’ Chrysostom 
(on Rom. 1.6.) calls it “the peace by 
which the Apostle expels all disturbing 
thought and beginning of smallminded- 
ness ... this kiss softens and levels”. 
But the practice was obviously liable to 
abuse as Clement of Alexandria shows, 
“love is judged not in a kiss but in 
good will. Some do nothing but fill the 
the Churches with noise of kissing. .. . 
There is another—an impure—kiss full of 
venom pretending to holiness” (Paed., 
ili. 301 Ρ.). Therefore it was regulated 
(Apost. Const., ii. 57, 12, men kiss men 
only) and gradually dwindled.—eip7v 7. 
The simple Hebrew salutation is proper 
to Peter’s autograph postscript and links 
it with the beginning.—troits ἐν 
Χριστῷ, cf. iii. 16, v. το, and the 
saying, Thus have I spoken to you that 
in me ye might have peace: in the world 
ye have tribulation but be of good cheer 
I have conquered the world (John xvi. 


33). 


THE SECOND EPISTLE GENERAL 


PETER 


i 





INTRODUCTION. 
CHAPTER I. 


AUTHENTICITY AND DATE, 
EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 


Fourth Century.—In considering the external evidence for the 
authenticity of 2 Peter, it will be found most convenient to proceed 
from the earliest date when its place was fixed in the Canon of the 
New Testament. This date must be found in the fourth century a.p. 
Even then, the Epistle was rejected by the Syrian Church, where it 
was not accepted till early in the sixth century, and only by the 
Monophysites. The view of the Church of Rome is represented 
chiefly by JERomE, whose influence was paramount in the formation 
of the Vulgate Canon. He mentions the doubts raised by the differ- 
ences in style and character between 1 and 2 Peter (Quest. ad Hedib. 
Migne, Pal. Lat., xxii. 1002). Jerome, however, is clearly expressing 
only the objections of scholars. He says: “Scripsit duas epistulas, 
quae Catholicae nominantur ; quarum secunda a plerisque eius esse 
negatur, propter stili cum priore dissonantiam,” where “a plerisque,” 
and the nature of the difficulty expressed, both point to the opinion of 
the learned class, which he does not himself share. The Epistle is 
quoted in the last quarter of the fourth century by ‘“‘ AMBROSIASTER ” ! 
and by AmBrosE ΟΕ ΜΊΑΝ (de Fide, iii. 12). In an African list, Canon 
Mommsenianus, belonging to the middle of the fourth century, 2 Peter 
is found inserted, but with a protest, which indicates rejection in the 
mind of the scribe. Dipymus, who wrote a commentary on 2 Peter, 
towards the end of the fourth century, uses the following words, which 
are a fragment come down to us in a Latin translation, ‘non igitur 
ignorandum praesentem epistolam esse falsatam, quae licet publicetur, 
non tamen in canone est”. Howare we to explain the words in italics, 
in view of the fact that in the De Tvinitate, a later treatise, Didymus 
quotes repeatedly from 2 Peter? Chase suggests that the phrase 
represents the Greek words ὡς νοθεύεται αὕτη ἦ ἐπιστολή, which would 


Cf. Souter, Study of Ambrosiaster, p. 196 f., Pseudo-Augustine Quaestiones, 
εἰς, (Vindob. 1908), p. 499. 


84 INTRODUCTION 


mean that the writer was only stating the opinion of others, more 
or less contemporary. Zahn (Gesch. Kan., 1. i. p. 312) urges that 
Didymus is here recording a judgment of the second or third century, 
but there appears to be no conclusive reason to doubt that he is 
recording a contemporary opinion. Eusgsius (H. E., iii. 3) dis- 
cusses the canonicity of 2 Peter, and makes the following important 
statement: τὴν δὲ φερομένην αὐτοῦ δευτέραν οὐκ ἐνδιάθηκον μὲν εἶναι 
παρειλήφαμεν, ὅμως δὲ πολλοῖς χρήσιμος φανεῖσα μετὰ τῶν ἄλλων ἐσ- 
πουδάσθη γραφῶν. ‘‘ The opinion has been handed down to us that the 
so-called Second Epistle (of Peter) is not canonical, but it has. 
been studied along with the other Scriptures, as it appears profit- 
able tomany”’. Inthe ἢ. E., iti. 25, 2 Peter is placed among the 
ἀντιλεγόμενα, although “accepted by the majority” (γνωρίμων δ᾽ οὖν 
ὅμως τοῖς πολλοῖς). Eusebius had a second class of ἀντιλεγόμενα which 
he regarded also as spurious (νόθα), and 2 Peter is classed with 
James, Jude, 2 and 3 John as disputed books which were also 
γνώριμα. The evidence of Eusebius is specially valuable (1) because 
he records the opinion that in his day 2 Peter was regarded as un- 
canonical ; (2) because he records a judgment of the past against it ; 
(3) he failed to find any recognition of the book as Petrine in the 
earlier literature known to him, and his knowledge was wide. There 
can be little doubt that Eusebius himself rejected the idea of Petrine 
authorship, but he was also one of those to whom it was a “ pro- 
fitatle’”’ bock. Constantine entrusted Eusebius with the prepar- 
ation, for use in the new Capital, of fifty copies of the Scriptures, 
which contained 2 Peter. This quasi-official standard practically did 
away with the distinction between ‘ acknowledged’ and ‘disputed’ 
books (Chase, H. 1). B., iii. 806 a). 

Another indication of fourth century opinion is the inclusion of 
2 Peter in the catalogues of Grecory ΝΑΖΙΑΝΖΕΝ (d. 391), Cyrit oF 
JERUSALEM (ἃ. 386), and ArHanasius (d. 373). One catalogue which 
is contained in the CopEx CLAROMONTANUS (sixth century), and re- 
garded by Tischendorf and Westcott as earlier than the fourth cen- 
tury, recognises seven Catholic Epistles, together with the Shepherd 
of Hermas, Acts of Paul, and Apocalypse of Peter. On the other 
hand, in the list of AmpHiLocnius, Bishop of Iconium (c. 380), only 
one Epistle of Peter is recognised. We have already seen that the 
Syriac-speaking churches unanimously rejected 2 Peter, and con- 
siderable importance is to be attached to the fact that Curysostom 
acknowledges only the Catholic Epistles, and that THEoporE oF 
Mopsugst14 describes five Epistles, among which is 2 Peter, as 
‘‘mediae auctoritatis”. “Since Chrysostom’s expositions, at any 


INTRODUCTION 85 


rate, were addressed to popular audiences, the rejection of the Epistle 
by the great teachers in question must have reflected the usage of 
the Antiochene Church in general.” (Chase, of. cit., iii. 805.) 

If we pass in review the evidence afforded by the usage of the 
fourth century in regard to this Epistle, we find that there was a 
considerable prevailing feeling of doubt as to the Petrine authorship, 
along with instances of definite rejection. It is, however, specially 
significant, in view of the modern tendency to depreciate the Epistle, 
that it seems to have gained a place in the Canon by virtue of its 
contents and its useful opposition to the doctrines of false teachers. 

Third Century —Metuoptus, a bishop of Lycia at the end of the 
third century, who suffered in the Diocletian persecution, explicitly 
quotes 2 Peter iii. 8 in the fragment De Resurrectione. Zahn 
(Gesch, Kan., 1. i. p. 313) has collected some passages in the same 
treatise which seem to echo 2 Peter iii. 10-13, and while in these the 
thought, rather than the language, recalls 2 Peter, there seems no 
reason to doubt the reference. Methodius regards the Apocalypse 
of Peter also as inspired (Comm.; Virg., ii. Ὁ). A further pre- 
sumption in favour of the use by Methodius of 2 Peter is found in 
the DiaLocuge oF ADAMANTIUS, written probably in the later years of 
Constantine, which makes large use of the works of Methodius. In 
this work 2 Peter is quoted. Firmiian, bishop of Czsarea in Cappa- 
docia, evidently refers to 2 Peter in a letter to Cyprian (No. 75). 
His words are: ‘‘ Stephanus adhuc etiam infamans Petrum et 
Paulum beatos apostolos . . . qui in epistolis suis haereticos exse- 
crati sunt, et ut eos evitemus monuerunt”. The allusion to heretics 
applies only to 2 Peter. 

We come now to the evidence of OriGEN. In his extant Greek 
works there is a reference to 2 Peter of a somewhat ambiguous kind. 
“Peter left one recognised Epistle, and perhaps a second; for it is 
disputed ” (Πέτρος δέ. . . μίαν ἐπιστολὴν ὁμολογουμένην καταλέλοιπεν " ἔστω 
δὲ καὶ δευτέραν - ἀμφιβάλλεται γάρ) ; (quoted Eusebius, H. Ε., VI. xxv. 
8). In the Latin translation of his works by Rufinus there are some 
passages expressly quoting 2 Peter, ¢.g., 2 Peter, i. 4, ‘ad participa- 
tionem capiendam divinae naturae sicut Petrus Apostolus edocuit ”’ 
(Ep. ad Rom. iv.9. Ed. Lomm., vi. 302). 2 Peter, i. 2, ““ Petrus in 
epistola sua dicit. Gratia uobis et pax multiplicatur in recognitione 
Dei” (2b., viii. 6. Ed. Lomm., vii. 234). 2 Peter, ii. 19, ‘Scio 
enim scriptum esse, quia unusquisque a quo vincitur huic et servus 
addicitur” (in Exod. xii. 4. Ed. Lomm., ix. p. 149). Also in a 
passage which contains an allegorical use of the trumpet blasts 
before Jericho, it is written, “Petrus etiam duabus epistolarum 

VOL. V. 6 


86 INTRODUCTION 


suarum personat tubis” (Hom. in ¥Fos., xii. 1. Ed. Lomm., xi. 62). 
These passages have had grave doubt cast on their genuineness 
by Dr. Chase (of. cit., p. 8036). There can, at least, be no 
doubt, judging from the one undisputed reference, that Origen 
reflects a serious division of opinion in his time, and that his own 
opinion tends towards rejection (ἔστω δὲ καὶ δευτέραν) of the Petrine 
authorship. 

As regards CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA, the main question to be 
settled is whether in the Hypotyposeis he comments on 2 Peter. 
If we are to take the statements of Eusebius (H. Ε., VI. xiv. 1) 
and Photius (Bibliothec, 109), he commented “on all the Catholic 
Epistles”. On the other hand, Cassiodorus, who wrote some 300 
years afterwards, gives most conflicting evidence. At one time he 
says that Clement expounded the Scriptures of the Old and New 
Testaments “from beginning to end,” and in another passage, where 
he is giving a list of the canonical Epistles expounded by Clement, 
he. omits 2 Peter. Moreover, in Cassiodorus’ translation of Clement’s 
Expositions, none are given of 2 Peter. The difficulty may be 
solved by supposing that in Clement’s work, 2 Peter had a place 
beside the Apocalypse of Peter, which was included in the Hypoty- 
poseits. (So Chase, op. cit., 802 a, and Zahn. Forsch. iii. p. 154.) 
Clement distinctly quotes the Apocalypse of Peter as the work of 
Peter, and as Scripture (Ecloge ex Script. Proph., xli., xlviii., xlix). 
Accepting the statements of Eusebius and Photius quoted above, and 
supposing that for purposes of exposition 2 Peter was merged in the 
Apocalypse of Peter, we may find confirmation of the first statement 
of Cassiodorus in certain passages of Clement’s writing which have 
been collected by Mayor (The Epistle of St. fude and the Second 
Epistle of St. Peter, Introd., cxix.) and Bigg (Commentary on 
First and Second Peter, p. 202). In these the word-parallels are 
striking, but they would not necessarily constitute valid evidence in 
themselves. 

In the writings of Cyprian we find no trace of 2 Peter, but it 
must not be forgotten that Firmitian’s letter to him, quoted above, 
contains a clear allusion. In Hrppotytus there are found passages 
that point to acquaintance with 2 Peter (Chase, 804 b, Bigg, p. 203). 
A portion of evidence that must not be omitted here is afforded by 
the division of sections in Copex B. In this manuscript there are 
two divisions of sections, and one is older than the other. The 
double division is preserved in all the Catholic Epistles except 
2 Peter, where the older division is wanting. The conclusion is 
inevitable that in the older form of Codex B, 2 Peter was wanting. 


- 


INTRODUCTION 87 


To sum up the evidence of the third century, we find that 2 Peter 
was in use so far as to influence the thought of Hippolytus in Rome, 
to be commented on by Clement of Alexandria, and to be expressly 
quoted by Firmilian and Methodius in Asia Minor. Although no 
reference is found in the writings of Cyprian of Carthage, yet 
Firmilian’s letter with the quotation is addressed to him. This is 
scarcely evidence, but it certainly implies Cyprian’s knowledge of 
the Epistle, and also that he would concur in its use as a source 
of quotation. Again, the two great Egyptian versions of this cen- 
tury, the Saniic and Bonairic, both contain 2 Peter. If we accept 
a conjectural emendation of Zahn’s in the language of the Mura- 
TORIAN CANON, there is contained in it a reference to the division of 
opinion in the Church with regard to this Epistle (Gesch. Kan. i., 
p. 110 n.).! Origen’s statement that “it is disputed,” represents a 
widespread doubt as to its genuineness. This attitude, combined 
with a general willingness to respect its contents, must be regarded 
as the mind of the church about 2 Peter in the third century. 

Second Century.—In a document which is preserved in a seventh 
century MS. entitled Actus Perri cum Simone (xx., ed. Lips., p. 67) 
there occurs a passage which contains several striking parallels with 
2 Peter. The following phrases may be noted (1) “ majestatem 
suam videre in monte sancto,” (2) “ vocem eius audivi talem qualem 
referre non possum”. In (2) there is a parallel to the rather remark- 
able phrase, φωνῆς τοιᾶσδε, of 2 Peter i. 17. It is true that the extant 
MS. only represents a Latin translation of the original Greek, and 
that editors and translators may interpolate. At the same time, it is 
difficult not to regard Chase as over-sceptical in seeking to discredit 
the parallel by regarding the whole passage as an interpolation (0). 
cit., 802 δ). There seems no reason why we should not accept the 
passage as an important second century attestation of 2 Peter, and 
as an indication that the Epistle had already some position in the 
Church. Turning next to the CLEMENTINE LITERATURE, we have in 
the Recognitions (v. 12) what appears to be a reference to 2 Peter 
ii. 19: “ Unusquisquis illius fit servus cui se ipse subjecerit’’. Rufinus 


1The passage in question reads, as amended by Zahn, “ Apocalypses etiam 
Johannis et Petri (unam) tantum recipimus (epistulam; fertur etiam altera), quam 
quidam ex nostris legi in ecclesia nolunt”. The emendations are apt, but is it possible, 
if we have regard to the loose grammatical construction everywhere in the document, 
that no change is needed? The Apocalypse of Peter may be referred to as the 
document “ quam quidam, etc.,” and we have seen reason to believe (¢.g., in case of 
Clement of Alexandria), that 2 Peter and the Apoc. Petri were sometimes regarded as 
one whole 


88 INTRODUCTION 


is again the translator of the Recognitions, and we are reminded of 
his translation of Origen (In Exod. Hom., 12), “ Unusquisque a quo 
vincitur huic et servus addicitur”. The translations are both of the 
same passage in 2 Peter, and the variety in the language, so far 
from countenancing a theory of interpolation on the part of Rufinus 
may well indicate that he is translating at different times separate 
references to the same passage. In the Homilies (xvi. 20) there occurs 
a reference, pointed out by Salmon (Introduction, p. 488 n.) to 2 Peter 
iii. 9, τοὐναντίον μακροθυμεῖ, εἰς μετάνοιαν καλεῖ. The context also is con- 
firmatory. Peter is speaking of the blasphemies of Simon Magus, 
which appear to have been similar in character to the false teaching 
that is denounced in 2 Peter. All things have been as they were 
from the foundation of the world. The earth has not opened; fire 
has not come down from heaven; rain is not poured out; beasts are 
not sent forth from the thicket to avenge their spiritual adultery. 
Then come the words quoted, “But, on the contrary, he is long- 
suffering, and calls to repentance’. Yet Chase says, “ It is difficult 
to see what there is in the context which specially recalls 2 Peter.” 
The coincidences mentioned by Salmon (0. czt., p. 488) in the writ- 
ing of THEOPHILUS OF ANTIOCH are inconclusive, although the words 
in 11. 9, ot δὲ τοῦ θεοῦ ἄνθρωποι πνευματόφοροι πνεύματος ἁγίου καὶ προφῆται 
γενόμενοι recall 2 Peter i. 21. In ii. 18, 6 λόγος αὐτοῦ, φαίνων ὥσπερ 
λύχνος ἐν οἰκήματι συνεχομένῳ, May be compared with 2 Peter i. 19. 
Similarly, in Tatian, Or. ad Graecos, 15 (Otto vi., p. 70), σκήνωμα 
(= body) is reminiscent of its similar use in 2 Peter i. 13. To found 
an argument, however, for the use of 2 Peter by these writers on 
such single words and expressions is precarious. They might well be 
part of the current vocabulary. In the Apology of AristipEs (129- 
130) a passage occurs that naturally suggests 2 Peter i. 11 and ii. 2. 
ἡ 6805 τῆς ἀληθείας ἥτις τοὺς ὁδεύοντας αὐτὴν εἰς Thy αἰώνιον xetpaywyet 
βασιλείαν (A polog., xvi.). IREN#US introduces a quotation from 1 
Peter with the words, “ Petrus ait in epistola sua”’ (iv. 9, 2), but this 
does not necessarily imply that he knew only one Petrine letter. He 
knew 2 John, and yet quotes 1 John in the same phrase. The phrase 
in 2 Peter iii. 8 occurs in Irenzeus v. 23, 2, ‘‘ Dies Domini sicut mille 
anni,” and in v. 28, 3, ἡ yap ἡμέρα κυρίου ὡς χίλια ἔτη. In both pas- 
sages, however, the words are connected with Chiliasm, which is 
absent from the thought of 2 Peter. In THe EpisTLe oF THE 
CHURCHES OF Lyons AND VIENNE, With which Irenzeus was closely 
connected (date 177-179) we find the words ὁ δὲ διὰ μέσου καιρὸς οὐκ 
ἀργὸς αὐτοῖς οὐδὲ ἄκαρπος ἐγίνετο (cf. 2 Peter i. 8). 

The most important question in the external evidence of the second 


INTRODUCTION 89 


century arises in connexion with the ApPocALypsE oF PETER, to which 
Harnack assigns the date 110-160, or probably 120-140. The work 
is used by the Viennese Church, and therefore the earlier date is 
more likely. Only a fragment of the Apocalypse is preserved to us, 
, in which there are some striking coincidences with 2 Peter (cf. 
M. R. James, A Lecture on the Revelation of Peter). Some of these 
may be quoted here: (1) πολλοὶ ἐξ αὐτῶν ἔσονται ψευδοπροφῆται, καὶ ὅδους 
καὶ δόγματα ποικίλα τῆς ἀπωλείας διδάξουσιν - ἐκεῖνοι δὲ υἱοὶ τῆς ἀπωλείας 
γενήσονται. καὶ τότε ἐλεύσεται ὁ θεός. .. καὶ κρινεῖ τοὺς υἱοὺς τῆς ἀνομίας 
(Apoc. 81; cf. 2 Peter ii. 1, ili. 7,12.) (2) 6 Κύριος ἔφη, “Aywper eis 
τὸ ὄρος. . . ἀπερχόμενοι δὲ pet αὐτοῦ ἡμεῖς οἱ δώδεκα μαθηταί (Apoc. 
ἃ 2; cf. 2 Ῥείεγ i. 18). The passage goes on to say that the Apostles 
desired “that He would show them one of our righteous brethren 
who have departed,” iva ἴδωμεν ποταποί (2 Peter iii. 11) εἰσι τὴν μορφήν, 
καὶ θαρσήσαντες παραθαρσύνωμεν Kat τοὺς ἀκούοντας ἡμῶν ἀνθρώπους (cf. 
ἐγνωρίσαμεν ὑμῖν, 2 Peter i. 16) ; ἔχομεν βεβαιότερον (i. 19). (9) τόπον 

. αὐχμηρὸν πάνυ ;. .. σκοτεινὸν εἶχον αὐτῶν τὸ ἔνδυμα κατὰ τὸν ἀέρα 
τοῦ τόπου (§ 6; οὔ. 1. 19). (4) A frequent use of κολάζειν, or the noun 
(cf. §§ 6, 7, 10, 11, 2 Peter ii. 9). (5) οἱ βλασφημοῦντες τὴν ὁδὸν τῆς 
δικαιοσύνης (§ 6; cf. § 13 and 2 Peter ii. 2,21). (6) (a) λίμνη tis . . 
πεπληρωμένη βορβόρου (8 8. βόρβορος occurs in § 9 twice, and in 
§ 16); (δ) ἐκυλίοντο (8 15; cf. 11. 22). (7) ἀμελήσαντες τῆς ἐντολῆς 
τοῦ θεοῦ (8 15; cf. ii. 21, iii, 2). (8) (2) ἡ γῆ παραστήσει πάντας 
τῷ θεῷ ἐν ἡμέρᾳ κρίσεως καὶ αὐτὴ μέλλουσα κρίνεσθαι σὺν καὶ τῷ περιέχοντι 
οὐρανῷ (quoted by Macarius Magnes, A pocritica iv. 6). (6) τακήσεται 
πᾶσα ϑύναμις οὐρανοῦ, Kal ἑλιχθήσεται 6 οὐρανὸς ὡς βιβλίον, καὶ πάντα 
τὰ ἄστρα πεσεῖται Mac. Magn. op. cit. iv. 7; cf. 2 Peter iii. 10-13; 
see Mayor, ed. pp. cxxx. ff.). 

All scholars are agreed that these and other coincidences are 
more than accidental (cf. Salmon, of. czt., p. 591). Various hypo- 
theses to account for them are suggested. 

(1) Did 2 Peter borrow from the Apocalypse ? (Harnack, Chrono- 
logie, p. 471). A comparison, however, of the language of the two 
documents suggests that 2 Peter is simpler and shorter in the ex- 
pression of the same ideas; and in some cases, ideas and phrases, 
separated in 2 Peter, are gathered together in one passage in the 
Apocalypse (ef. (1), (2), (8) above). Bigg (op. czt., p. 207) also con- 
tends against this hypothesis on the ground that the description of 
hell is suggested by Plato, Aristophanes, Homer, and especially 
Virgil, and points to a later date than the Epistle. The rare word 
ταρταρώσας is indeed used by 2 Peter of the punishment of the wicked 
after death, and the conception is undoubtedly derived from heathen 


90 INTRODUCTION 


mythology. The word, however, is found in Jewish writings, which 
2 Peter may have read (see note on il. 4). 

(2) Are 2 Peter and the Apocalypse by the same author? 
(Sanday, Inspiration, p. 347). This view is opposed by Chase 
(op. cit., 815) on the ground of the difference in style. ‘The Apo- 
calypse,” he says, “is simple and natural in its style. There is 
nothing remarkable in its vocabulary.”” The argument would seem 
to be conclusive, as the style of 2 Peter is unmistakable, and would 
be easily recognised. At the same time, the undoubted similarity 
between the two writings “not only in words or indefinitely marked 
ideas, but also in general conceptions—e.g., in both there is the picture 
drawn of Christ on the mountain with His Apostles, the latter being 
admitted to a secret revelation which they should afterwards use for 
the confirmation of their disciples—seems to be an argument of some 
strength in favour of the view that the two documents are the product 
of the same school’”’ (Chase). 

(3) Does the Apocalypse borrow from 2 Peter? Some of the 
arguments already adduced against the contrary hypothesis (i.) are 
really in favour of this supposition. The “naturalness of the words 
and phrases as they stand in their several contexts in the Apocalypse,” 
which is brought forward by Chase as an argument against this 
third hypothesis (of. cit., p. 815 δ) is really only a compliment to 
the style of the writing, and an indication that the writer has no 
intention of slavishly imitating 2 Peter, or of forming a kind of 
mosaic of his own and another’s diction. As regards the absence 
in the Apocalypse of the strange and remarkable phrases of 2 Peter 
that they were strange and remarkable might be precisely the reason 
why they were avoided or modified. ἐβασάνιζεν in 2 Peter ii. 8 is 
rendered by δοκιμάζω in Apocalypse, ὃ 1; the reference to the Trans- 
figuration in the Apocalypse is fuller than in 2 Peter, and would seem 
to indicate reflection on the Petrine narrative (e.g., cf. addition of ot 
δώδεκα μαθηταί to simple ἡμεῖς in 2 Peter 1. 18; and expression τὸ 
ὄρος for τῷ ἁγίῳ ὄρει). Such a phrase as ἐν τόπῳ σκοτεινῷ, might 
well be a paraphrase of ἐν αὐχμηρῷ τόπῳ, a much rarer word, and 
it is extremely unlikely that αὐχμ. would be substituted for σκοτεινός. 
It is therefore most probable that the Apocalypse is indebted to 
2 Peter, which would suggest a date for the Epistle earlier than 
120-140 (cf. p. 181). 

In the so-called SEconp EpisTLE oF CLEMENT (130-170) there is a 
passage deserving of notice. γινώσκετε δὲ ὅτι ἔρχεται ἤδη ἡ ἡμέρα τῆς 
κρίσεως ὡς κλίβανος καιόμενος καὶ τακήσονται at δυνάμεις τῶν οὐρανῶν καὶ 
πᾶσα ἡ γῆ ὡς μόλυβδος ἐπὶ πυρὶ τηκόμενος καὶ τότε φανήσεται τὰ κρύφια 


INTRODUCTION ΟἹ 


καὶ φανερὰ ἔργα τῶν ἀνθρώπων (xvi. 3). One or two interesting points 
are raised by this passage. 

(1) Where does the writer derive the conception of the day of 
judgment as meaning the destruction of the universe by fire? He 
clearly quotes Mal. iv. 1, Isa. xxxiv. 4, but these passages are not 
sufficient to suggest the idea unless to one already familiar with the 
doctrine. Bigg (Comm. pp. 214-15) argues at some length that 
this doctrine is ultimately to be traced to 2 Peter. Justin (Afol., i. 
20) traces the belief in the world-fire to the Sybil (Book iv.) and 
Hystaspes. Bigg holds that both these belong to the same familv as 
the pseudo-Petrine literature. The destruction of the world by fire 
was not an article of faith among the Jews, and Philo argues strongly 
against it (On the Incorruptibility of the World). The office of fire 
in the O.T. is to purify, and not to destroy (Isa. xxxiv. 4, li. 6, Ixvi. 
15, 16, 22; Mal. iv. 1). Inthe N.T. (e.g., Heb. xii. 26-29; 1 Cor. iii. 
13; 2 Thess. i. 8; Apoc. xxi. 1) the conception of fire is distinctly that 
of a purifying agency. It is to be noted, however, against Bigg’s 
view, that the conception of 2 Peter is not altogether at variance with 
the doctrine of the N.T. about the office of fire. The destruction of 
the present universe is vividly described in Chapter III., but the 
writer evidently has the idea of purification in his mind, and not of 
annihilation. ‘‘ Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look 
for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness” 
(iii. 13). Accordingly, if the passage quoted from 2 Clement is to be 
taken in the sense of annihilation by fire, it cannot be regarded as 
founded exclusively on 2 Peter. 

(2) Is there anything in the language to connect the two? ἡμέρα 
κρίσεως is found in N.T. only in St. Matthew's Gospel (x. 15, xi. 22, 
24), in 1 John (iv. 17), and in 2 Peter (ii. 9, iii. 7). In 2 Peter iii. 10, 
however, the expression is ἡμέρα κυρίου. τήκομαι is also a word 
common to 2 Peter (iii. 12) and the passage in 2 Clem. An import- 
ant coincidence is φανήσεται. . . ἔργα, which may be an attempt to 
make sense of the very doubtful reading in 2 Peter iti. 10 (ἔργα 
εὑρεθήσεται). On the whole, the similarity of language and the 
affinity of thought in the two passages must be regarded as estab- 
lishing a connexion. (For other coincidences, see Spitta, Der zweite 
Brief des Petrus und der Brief des $udas, p. 534 n.) 

In the Epistts oF Barnagas (130-31, Harnack), in a Chiliastic 
passage, the words occur, 7 γὰρ ἡμέρα παρ᾽ αὐτῷ χίλια ἔτη. αὐτὸς δέ 
por μαρτυρεῖ λέγων, ἰδοὺ ἡμέρα Κυρίου ἔσται ὡς χίλια ἔτη (χν. 4)η. It has 
been pointed out that παρ᾽ αὐτῷ is very close to 2 Peter’s παρὰ κυρίῳ, 
and the repetition of the words points to the quotation of some 


92 INTRODUCTION 


recognised utterance of Scripture. Barnabas, also, is in the habit of 
using λέγει to introduce his quotations from Scripture. The question 
is whether he is quoting 2 Peter iii. 8 or some other source. The 
context in Barnabas is different from that in 2 Peter. He is deal- 
ing with the mystical interpretation of the passage Gen. ii. 16. 
Also, in 2 Peter no Chiliastic meaning is attached, as in Barnabas. 
In all probability, 2 Peter iii. 8 is regarded by Barnabas as an 
authority for Chiliasm, along with Rev. xx. 4 ff, which he 
quotes. In THe SHEPHERD oF Hermas (110-140, Harnack) there 
are certain words and phrases that are found only in 2 Peter, 
μιασμός (Sim. v. 1, 2); βλέμμα (in different sense appearance ; Sim. 
vi. 2,5); ϑυσνόητος (Sim. ix. 14, 4); αὐθάδεις, applied to false teachers 
(Sim. ix. 22, 1.)!| In CLement or Rome (93-95, Harnack) we find 
several phrases which, in N.T., are peculiar to 2 Peter: rots δὲ 
ἑτεροκλινεῖς ὑπάρχοντας εἰς κόλασιν Kal αἰκισμὸν τίθησιν (xi. 1); ἐπόπτης 
(used, however, of God) (lix. 3); αὐθάδη (i. 1); μῶμος (Ixiii. 1) ; 
μεγαλοπρεπεῖ δόξῃ αὐτοῦ (ix. 2), but μεγαλοπρεπεῖ βουλήσει Occurs 
previously in same paragraph; Νῶε ἐκήρυξεν μετάνοιαν (vii. 6). The 
passage in Clem. xxxiv. may also be noted: εἰς τὸ μετόχους ἡμᾶς 
γενέσθαι τῶν μεγάλων K. ἐνδόξων ἐπαγγελιῶν αὐτοῦ (cf. 2 Peteri. 4).2 These 
coincidences in Barnabas, in Clement, and in the Didache are 
scarcely conclusive as quotations, but they suggest a milieu of 
thought corresponding to 2 Peter. 

To what conclusion does the evidence of the second century lead ? 
Chase says, “ If we put aside the passage from the Clementine Recog- 
nitions and that from the Acts of Peter, as open to the suspicion of 
not accurately representing the original texts, there does not remain, 
it is believed, a single passage in which the coincidence with 2 Peter 
can, with anything approaching confidence, be said to imply literary 
obligation to that Epistle” (cf. Bacon, Introd., 173). It ought, how- 
ever, to be noted that the passage in the Clementine Recognitions 
can only be set aside on the ground that Rufinus can fairly be 
accused of interpolation; and the evident coincidences in the Actus 
Petri cum Simone can be dismissed only on account of distrust of 
the Latin translator of the work. We have also the evidence of 


10Of the passages collected by Zahn (der Hirt der Hermas, p. 431) as having 
affinity with 2 Peter, the most striking is Sim. vi. 4, 4: τῆς τρυφῆς καὶ ἀπάτης ὁ 
χρόνος ὥρα ἐστὶ μία. τῆς δὲ βασάνον ἣ ὥρα τριάκοντα ἡμέρων δύναμιν ἔχει. ἐαν 
οὖν μίαν ἡμέραν τρυφήσῃ τις καὶ ἀπατηθῇ K.7.A. (cf. 2 Peter ii. 13). 

2Spitta, p. 534 n., points out a passage in the Didache (ili. 6-8) having a remark- 
able affinity with Jude and 2 Peter. γόγγυσος, a rare word (Jude 16) is used. 
βλασφημία, αὐθάδης and τρέμων are twice repeated (cf. 2 Peter ii. ro). 


INTRODUCTION 93 


dependence in the Apocalypse of Peter. It is doubtful whether 
any of the Apostolic Fathers make use of the Epistle, but the 
coincidences in word and thought in 2 Clement, Barnabas, Hermas, 
Didache, and Clement of Rome cannot be ignored. They at least 
suggest a possible atmosphere of thought for 2 Peter. On the 
‘whole, the evidence of the second century would suggest a date 
for the Epistle not much later than the first decade. There is 
an entire absence of evidence tor the Petrine authorship. 


CHAPTER ll. 
INTERNAL EVIDENCE OF AUTHENTICITY. 


1, The obvious first step to be taken is to examine the References to 
the Gospel History in the Epistle, and to consider what light they 
may throw on the authorship of the Epistle. 

(1) Chap. i. 3. τοῦ καλέσαντος ἡμᾶς. The reference of the parti- 
ciple is to Ἰησοῦ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν (cf. note). Does ἡμᾶς refer to the 
Apostles, and in particular to the call of St. Peter? This interpre- 
tation involves that ἡμῖν ini. 1 likewise refers to the Apostles. Other 
indications, however, in the Epistle point to a group of scattered 
Christian communities in Asia Minor as the recipients of the letter, 
and the sense in i. 1 seems to be that the readers of the letter, who: 
are isolated and harassed by false teachers, are set on equal terms 
with “us,’ who occupy a less difficult position, and enjoy greater 
outward privileges. Again, ini. 4 the best attested reading is ἡμῖν 
(not ὑμῖν), and clearly there the reference is to the writer and 
readers together. So ἡμῶν ought to be taken in i. 2. ἡμᾶς must 
therefore consistently be referred to the body of readers with whom 
2 Peter identifies himself in thought, as united in their common 
faith, and not to the Apostles alone. Spitta (of. czt., pp. 37 ff.), 
arguing for the reference to the Gospel History, takes ἡμᾶς as. 
referring to the calling of the immediate Apostles, in contrast to. 
those who believed in response to their preaching. Such a sense 
would by no means suit ἡμῖν in i. 4. Also, in i. 10 κλῆσιν clearly 
refers to writer and readers taken together. Moreover, καλεῖν in 
N.T. is by no means confined to the call of the first disciples (cf. 
Matt. ix. 13). In Rom. ix. 24 the thought is almost exactly parallel 
to this passage, ‘‘even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews. 
only, but also of the Gentiles”’. 

(2) Chap. i. 16 ff.—The Transfiguration—If we compare the 
reference here with the Synoptic accounts, there emerge some in- 
teresting points of difference. All three Synoptics speak as though 
the glory had its source from within. Such can only be the signifi- 
cance of μετεμορφώθη (Matt. and Mark): and the ἐγένετο... ἕτερον of 


INTRODUCTION 95 


Luke is an indication that he interpreted the phenomenon as an 
inward change. He also tells us that it was ἐν τῷ προσεύχεσθαι, “as 
he was praying,” that the change took place (Luke ix. 29). 2 Peter, 
_ on the other hand, seems to think of the glory as having an outward 
source, like what happened in the case of Moses (Exod. xxxiv. 29 ff. ; 
2 Cor. iii. 7 ff.), as a reflexion of the glory of God, an outward attesta- 
tion in addition to the voice (λαβὼν yap παρὰ θεοῦ πατρὸς τιμὴν Kal 
δόξαν, i. 17). Spitta argues that this is a more natural and primitive 
account, and therefore independent of the account in the Synoptics, 
which shows traces of later thought playing upon the incident. There 
can be no doubt that the conception of the glory as external is found 
in 2 Peter, but it is not regarded as an attestation previous to the 
voice, as in the Synoptics. On the contrary, the two aorist participles 
imply coincident action, the first really taking the place of a finite verb 
(cf. the common phrase, ἀποκριθεὶς εἶπεν). ‘‘ He received honour and 
glory when there came to Him,” etc. Moreover, τιμή can only refer 
to the attestation of the voice (see note on passage). To this extent 
2 Peter differs from the Synoptic gospels. Are we then justified in 
regarding the disparity as a mark of the eye-witness? There are, 
however, other characteristics of the passage in 2 Peter which 
rather point to literary dependence on the Synoptic account. (a) 
The reading of SACKL, adopted in the text, is οὗτος ἔστιν 6 vids pou ὁ 
ἀγαπητός, εἰς ὃν ἐγὼ εὐδόκησα, which differs from Matt. xvii. 5 only in 
respect that (a) εἰς ὃν is substituted for ἐν 6 (see note on passage), 
(β) ἐγώ is inserted, and (y) ἀκούετε αὐτοῦ is omitted. Again, σκηνώματι 
(11. 12) σκηνώματος (ii. 14) and ἔξοδον (v. 15) occurring together, seem 
to indicate that the vocabulary of the Synoptic account was lingering 
in the mind of the writer. σκήνωμα, a rare and unusual word in this 
sense, is used characteristically in the sense of the ordinary σκῆνος, 
and may have been suggested by the σκήνη of the Gospel narrative. 
ἔξοδος belongs to Luke’s own vocabulary in reporting the conversation 
of the three men, and its employment indicates acquaintance with 
his Gospel. ‘‘Omission of details of the history (e.g., the presence 
of Moses and Elias) in an allusion contained in a letter cannot 
reasonably be taken to show that a writer is giving an account 
independent of, or more primitive than, that of the Synoptists” 
(Chase, of. cit. iii. 809 ὃ, but cf. Zahn, Introd. Il., pp. 217 f.). 
Moreover, ἐν τῷ ἁγίῳ ὄρει indicates a later stage of thought than 
the simple eis ὄρος ὑψηλὸν (Mark, ix. 2; Matt. 1. 7), or eis τὸ ὄρος (Luke 
ix. 26). It implies not only the assignment of a definite locality, but 
also the ascription of a ‘‘ sacred” site, ‘‘a known mountain which had 
now become consecrated as the scene of the vision’ (Mayor, of. cit., 


96 INTRODUCTION 


cxliv.). It is, of course, also possible to take ἐν τῷ ἁγίῳ ὄρει in sense 
of Isa. xi. 9, Ixii. 25. where it is used of the Messiah’s kingdom. “ Per- 
haps 2 Peter means that in the Transfiguration the three Apostles were 
admitted to behold the glories of that kingdom, without alluding to 
any particular Jewish mountain” (Mayor, iv., note 1). The passage 
betrays reflexion on the original incident, and is written from the 
standpoint of one who is concerned chiefly to interpret the “glory” 
of Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration as prophetic of His 
δύναμιν Kal παρουσίαν, which is the theme of the Epistle (ἐπόπται 
γενηθέντες τῆς ἐκείνου μεγαλειότητος), and as establishing the truthful- 
ness of the Apostles who preached the παρουσία. 

(3) Chap. i. 14: Prophecy of the death of St. Peter.—taywy ἐστιν ἡ 
ἀπόθεσις... καθὼς Kal 6 κύριος ἡμῶν I. X. ἐδήλωσεν por. Clearly there is 
here a reference to the incident in John xxi. 18. In the notes, ταχινή 
is taken to mean “imminent” and not in the sense of sudden death 
Spitta, amongst others, has argued strongly (pp. 88 f., 491 f.) that 
there is here no reference to the Gospel history, and is supported by 
Mayor. It is contended that the words ὅταν γηράσῃς, in John xxi. 15, 
imply that death was not imminent, and that in old age a man does 
not require a prophecy to tell him that death is near. Moreover, in 
the Johannine passage, the emphasis is not on the time but on the 
manner of St. Peter’s death. It is further suggested that some special 
revelation by Jesus to St. Peter of the near approach of death, not 
recorded in Scripture, must be meant, and that a reference may be 
intended to the story contained in the legend, “ Domine quo vadis?” 
found in the Clementine Homilies, and in the Apocalypse of Peter. 
The foregoing argument is founded on the supposition that καθὼς 
necessarily refers to the whole preceding clause, ὅτι... pov. It need 
not be so. The writer speaks as an old man, and the reference would 
then be to the prophesied death in oldage. The objection that old 
age in itself is a warning of approaching death seems trivial. That 
fact would not prevent the mention of a prophecy regarding it. Again, 
it is not necessary to suppose that 2 Peter actually has the passage 
John xxi. 18 in his mind. He may be referring independently to the 
incident. It is suggestive to compare the use of καθὼς καὶ here with 
iii, 15. There the καθὼς καὶ is added as a kind of afterthought, 
and is not really dependent on the principal verb ἡγεῖσθε. It has 
really the significance of another principal clause. The syntax 
would seem to be similar ini. 14. The matter of knowledge (εἰδὼς) 
is that death is near at hand, however that knowledge is suggested 
to him, and the clause καθὼς καὶ is added by way of further illus- 
tration. It is unreasonable to demand that the thought in 2 Peter 


INTRODUCTION 97 


must be an exact replica of the passage in John, if the reference is 
to be the same. 

(4) Chap. ii. 20 (γέγονεν αὐτοῖς τὰ ἔσχατα χείρονα τῶν πρώτων) is 
clearly areminiscence of the words of Jesus recorded in Matt. xii. 45, 
Luke xi. 29. 

These four references to the Gospel history have now been 
examined. The first may be set aside, and the other three may be 
regarded as indicating no more than a knowledge of the Gospels, and 
especially of two incidents in the life of St. Peter. They do not 
nearly amount to evidence that the writer is the Apostle himself. 

The paucity of references to the Gospel history, in an Epistle pur- 
porting to be written by the Apostle Peter, isremarkable. It contains 
only one reference to the actual words of Jesus (ii. 20), but indirectly 
these may be referred to in ii. 1 = Matt. x. 33; i. 8 = Luke xiii. 7-8 ; 
iii. 4 = Matt. xxiv. 37-42. We would expect that the mind of an in- 
timate disciple would have been saturated with reminiscences of our 
Lord’s teaching, and would have dwelt easily on the great events of 
His Life. In this respect we may compare 2 Peter most unfavourably 
with the genuine first Epistle. In the former there is no mention of 
the Passion or Resurrection, and there is a strange absence of that 
vivid sense of the Risen Lord as living and reigning in grace, which 
is so characteristic of the writings of the Apostles, who “ had been 
begotten again unto a living hope”. It is also a matter for serious 
consideration as against the genuineness of the Epistle, that the 
references to the Gospel history are introduced apparently to support 
the character of one writing as St. Peter, and to distinguish his state- 
ments from σεσοφισμένοι μῦθοι (i. 16). (But cf. Bigg. p. 231.) 

2 The Personality of St. Peter in the Epistle—(1) Chap. i. 1 
Συμεὼν Πέτρος δοῦλος καὶ ἀπόστολος ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ. The significance of 
the form Συμεὼν is very obscure. The point to be emphasised at 
present is that St. Peter is here represented as the writer of the 
Epistle. If, however, the Petrine authorship is untenable, how is 
the expression to be justified? In this connexion, one or two 
questions call for consideration. 

(a) Does the form of the words afford any indication that the name 
of St. Peter is being used by a later writer? His own description of 
himself in 1 Peter i. 1 is Πέτρος ἀπόστολος Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ. The form 
Συμεὼν is used only in one other passage, viz., Acts xv. 14, in the 
address of St. James at the Council of Jerusalem. δοῦλος is found 
in Jude 1, and in view of the evident dependence of 2 Peter on Jude, 
this fact may be regarded as significant. Again, if Spitta is right in 
supposing that by the use of the pre-Christian name, Συμεὼν, the writer 


} 
98 INTRODUCTION 


puts himself on a level with those whom he addresses, and prepares 
the way for the epithet ἰσότιμον (“equally privileged,” as between 
Jew and Gentile), it is evident that the whole title given to St. Peter 
is carefully chosen by a process of reflection. There is, therefore, 
a presumption that another mind is at work here, which has also 
borrowed largely from Jude in chap. ii. 

(ὁ) Ifthe name of St. Peter has been thus used, the Epistle is pseu- 
donymous. What is the distinction between pseudonymity in early 
Christian writings and forgery? Does pseudonymity imply ethical 
fault, and does it affect the authority of a writing? A most uncom- 
promising position in this regard is characteristic of the older criti- 
cism. Westcott (Canon, pp. 352 f.) in speaking of the disputed 
books of the Canon, says: ‘‘The Second Epistle of St. Peter is 
either an authentic work of the Apostle, or a forgery; for in this 
case there can be nomean. . .. It involves a manifest confusion of 
ideas to compensate for a deficiency of historical proof by a lower 
standard of canonicity. The extent of the Divine authority of a book 
cannot be made to vary with the completeness of the proof of its 
genuineness. The genuineness must be admitted before the authority 
can have any positive value, which from its nature cannot admit 
of degrees; and till the genuineness be established, the authority 
remains in abeyance.” In a note, Westcott adds, “These books (2 
Peter, James, Jude, Hebrews) have received the recognition of the 
Church in such a manner that, if genuine, they must be canonical”. 

The use of the term “forgery” in such a connexion ought to be 
avoided.! In the first place, the expression is an entire misunder- 
standing of the origin of much of the pseudepigraphic literature of the 
time, and on other grounds the term is equally objectionable. [ is, 
in effect,an attempt to browbeat the judgment into the acceptance of 
such books as genuine, on account of the difficulty of believing that 
the Church could accept into the Canon what is supposed to be the 
product of fraud and deceit. The question of pseudonymity cannot 
be settled “by a profession of moral indignation’. The idea that 
literary property is guarded by ethical considerations is essentially 
modern. “Believers frequently borrowed from the books of other 
believers or of unbelievers, without mentioning any source, and with- 
out considering themselves in any way as thieves.” “ With the best 
intentions and with the clearest consciences they put such words 
into the mouth of a revered Apostle as they wished to hear enun- 
ciated with Apostolic authority to their contemporaries, while yet 
they did not regard themselves in the smallest degree as liars and 


1 Zahn, who himself upholds the Petrine authorship, says ‘‘ The mere occurrence 
of Peter's name in an ancient writing is no proof of authorship ” (Introd.,ii., p. 270). 


INTRODUCTION 99 


deceivers” (Jiilicher, Introd., E. Tr., p. 52). The standard of 
genuineness applied to the early Christian writings, and especially 
in the formation of the Canon, was their conformity to the teaching 
of the Church. Were they orthodox or heretical? A case in point 
is the story related by TeRTULLIAN (De Baptismo, xvii.) of the writer 
of the Acts of Paul and Thecla, who was compelled to give up his 
office “on the ground that he imputed to Paul an invention of his 
own” (quasi titulo Pauli de suo cumulans). He defended himself 
by saying that he wrote out of regard for Paul, and that therefore 
he had not an evil conscience. The plea was evidently accepted, 
and he was convicted, not of literary fraud as such, but because he 
dared to advocate the heretical view that women had a right to 
preach and to baptise. We must also take into account in our 
estimate of pseudepigraphy what Jiilicher calls “the boundless credu- 
lity of ecclesiastical circles to which so many of the N.T. Apocrypha 
have owed their lasting influence”. Eusebius (H. E., τ. 13) quotes as 
genuine an Epistle purporting to be written by Christ to Agbarus. 
«It is evident,” says Mayor (p. xxv., note 1), “that there were among 
the early Christians good and pious men who had no scruple about 
impersonating not saints alone, but the Lord of saints Himself. 
We should gather the same from the readiness with which the 
orthodox worked up and expurgated the religious romances by which 
the heretics sought to popularise their doctrines.” 

The practice of pseudepigraphical writing is exemplified in the O.T. 
in Ecclesiastes, and in the apocryphal books of Wisdom, Esdras, 
Baruch, Enoch, and the Sibylline Oracles. The second century 
produced many pseudonymous books, such as the Gospel of Peter, 
which, after being read in the churches of Cilicia for some time, was 
at length forbidden by Serapion, bishop of Antioch, about the end of 
the century, on account of its docetic teaching. The unknown writer 
of 2 Peter made use of the name of St. Peter, both in order to mark 
his views as important, and because he believed them to be in 
accordance with what would have been St. Peter’s teaching under 
similar circumstances. 

(c) The foregoing may enable us to rid our minds of prejudice 
when we come to consider the question as to whether any genuine 
teaching of St. Peter is contained in this Epistle. Are there con- 
tained in the Epistle any actual reminiscences of St. Peter’s teaching, 
and is the work written by a disciple of St. Peter?! No attempt, 
of course, can be made to disentangle from the rest of the writing 


“Cf. Ramsay, Church in Roman Empire, pp. 492-3; Moffatt, Historical New 
Testament, p. 598. 


100 INTRODUCTION 


what might be regarded as the utterances of the Apostle, but a 
presumption in favour of the hypothesis of actual reminiscence 
may be obtained from a comparison of 1 and 2 Peter (see chap. iv.). 
Weiss has said that “no document in the N.T. is so like 2 Peter 
as 1 Peter”. Moreover, there is probably a reference in the second 
Epistle itself (i. 15), which is corroborated by tradition, to the 
fact that St. Peter’s teaching was subsequently embodied in the 
Gospel of St. Mark (so Jiilicher, Introd., E. Tr., p. 240). Mayor (p. 
cxliii. ff.) also favours this view, and successfully defends it against 
the objections of Zahn (Introd., ii., pp. 200-9).! Bigg considers that the 
statement in i. 15 gave rise to the whole body of pseudo-Petrine litera- 
ture (op. cit. p. 265). It is to be noted also that in two passages in 
the Epistle the pseudonymous writer betrays the consciousness that 
he is faithfully and honestly setting forth nothing inconsistent with 
the teaching of the Apostle. In iii. 1 he is not afraid to set the con- 
tents of his Epistle alongside those of 1 Peter without fear of contra- 
diction,? and again in iii. 15, his concern is evidently to show that 
there is no inconsistency between the Petrine and the Pauline teach- 
ing. These, and the other considerations adduced above ought to be 
a guarantee at least of the good faith of the writer of this Epistle. 
(2) Another instance where the personality of St. Peter is 
allowed to obtrude itself is found in i. 16, in the use of the word 
ἐπόπται. The word means eye-witness, with perhaps an added sense, 
derived from Gnostic sources, of spiritual vision. In the Apocalypse 
of Peter, there is an account of the Transfiguration which contains the 
words ἡμεῖς of δώδεκα μαθηταὶ ἐδεήθημεν ὅπως δείξη ἡμῖν ἕνα τῶν ἀδελφῶν 
. τῶν ἐξελθόντων ἀπὸ τοῦ κόσμου, ἵνα ἴδωμεν ποταποί εἰσι τὴν μορφήν 
(cf. Mayor, cxxv. note). Similarly in i. 18, of the Voice at the Trans- 
figuration, 2 Peter has ἡμεῖς ἠκούσαμεν. Jiilicher, in commenting on 
the pseudepigraphic character of 2 Peter, says that “the author 
never loses consciousness of the part he is playing,” and “ constructs 
his fiction methodically’. Among other instances, he cites this 
passage describing the Transfiguration. He sees in the structure 
of the Epistle only ‘an artificial production of learned ingenuity ”’ 
_(Introd., E. Tr., pp. 240, 241). It may be granted that the choice 
1If the words μετὰ τὴν ἐμὴν ἔξοδον are taken as implying that the Apostle was 
not yet dead, we are immediately involved in all the insuperable difficulties connected 
with a date for the Epistle earlier than a.p. 64, the traditional date of Peter’s martyr- 
dom. On the other hand, it is easy to see how this expression might be put into 
the mouth of Peter by a later disciple, who well knew his mind and the preparations 
he had made for preserving his teaching after his death. 


2 For consideration of the question whether the reference here is really to 1 Peter, 
see p. 113. 


INTRODUCTION IOI 


of the Transfiguration as the only incident in the Synoptic account 
of St. Peter’s life, to which reference is made, is an indication that 
the writer has made choice of this incident as suitable to his theme. 
At the same time, if it was legitimate for him to write under the 
honoured name at all, he could hardly have done so more naturally 
than he does in i. 16-18, especially as it is extremely probable that 
here he is making use of an actual reminiscence of the teaching 
of St. Peter himself (cf. notes on the passage). 

(3) Chap. ili. 15.—6 ἀγαπητὸς ἡμῶν ἀϑελφὸς Παῦλος. The exami- 
nation of the whole passage in the Commentary leads to the conclu- 
sion that the Epistles of St. Paul are regarded as in the same rank 
with the O.T. Scriptures. The date thus implied makes it impossible 
that the actual writer is St. Peter. Why, then, the conjunction of 
the two names? There can be little doubt that 2 Peter wishes to 
impress upon his readers the consistency of the teaching of St. Peter 
and St. Paul against the Antinomian interpretation of the Christian 
faith. The affectionate terms in which St. Paul is spoken of are 
exactly those that might have been used by St. Peter himself of his 
fellow-apostle, and if St. Peter were known to be already dead, how 
could there be any sane intention to deceive the readers? The 
phrase ὁ ἀγαπητὸς ἡμῶν ἀδελφὸς is used by St. Paul of Tychicus 
(Eph. vi. 21; Col. iv. 7) and of Onesimus (Col. iv. 9; Philem. v. 16). 
No doubt the readers of this Epistle were acquainted with the dis- 
agreement between the two Apostles described in Galatians ii. 11-14. 
2 Peter only reiterates the fact that there was never any fundamental 
opposition between their teaching. St. Peter’s full sympathy with 
the Pauline teaching is evident in the First Epistle, and this passage 
may easily be true to his mind. It is indeed significant that the 
attitude taken up towards the Pauline teaching is not without 
reserve (iii. 16, ἐν ais ἐστὶν δυσνόητά τινα), but the warm-hearted 
reference may be a real reminiscence. 


VOL. V. 7 


CHAPTER III. 
INTERNAL EVIDENCE AS TO DATE. 


We have next to examine any hints that may be given in the 
Epistle itself as to the Date of its composition. 

{ (1) Chap. i. 15—Here reference is made to the death of St. Peter 
as imminent. Other considerations render it impossible to hold that 
this Epistle was published during the lifetime of the Apostle who died 
c. 64 a.p. (see pp. 97 f.). The context shows that if the words pera 
τὴν ἐμὴν ἔξοδον are put into the mouth of St. Peter by a later writer, 
the period of writing must have been some time after his decease. 
ἑκάστοτε (as occasion arises) in v. 15 implies that occasion has arisen 
more than once to refer to the posthumous teaching. ἔχειν ὑμᾶς, 
x.t.A., implies a document or documents already in the possession of 
the Church. Again, if we are to see in this verse a reference to the 
tradition connecting St. Peter with the Gospel of Mark, we know that 
this tradition is at least much earlier than the time of Papias (140- 
160), who is quoted by Eusebius (H. £., iii. 39) as saying, καὶ τοῦτο 
ὃ πρεσβύτερος ἔλεγε, Μᾶρκος μὲν ἑρμηνευτὴς Πέτρου γενόμενος ὅσα 
ἐμνημόνευσεν ἀκριβῶς ἔγραψεν, οὐ μέντοι τάξει, τὰ ὑπὸ τοῦ Χριστοῦ ἢ 
λεχθέντα ἢ πραχθέντα. Papias himself is reporting the testimony 
which he had received orally from the Presbyter. rom the perfectly 
natural way in which the reference is introduced, we would conclude 
that 2 Peter has not in view a tradition which he found in such a 
writer as Papias, but betrays either a personal knowledge of the 
intentions of St. Peter himself, or an acquaintance with those who 
did know his mind. Hence a date not very much later than the 

, end of the first century is probable. 

| (2) In chap. iii. 4 the words occur, ἀφ᾽ ἧς yap οἱ πατέρες ἐκοιμήθησαν, 
πάντα οὕτως διαμένει ἀπ᾿ ἀρχῆς κτίσεως. Here οἱ πατέρες refers to the 
immediately preceding generation of Christians. The whole sentence 
refiects the disappointment and disillusionment experienced by those 
who saw men and women believing in the coming of the Lord in 
their life-time, and dying without having realised their expecta- 
tion, and who felt that all signs of an immediate coming in their 


INTRODUCTION 103 


own day were absent. Such an atmosphere of thought would be 
most intense in the second generation of Christians, and much of the 
Epistle is meant for the encouragement of those who still expected 
the delayed Parousia of the Lord, and whose minds were likely to 
feel the element of truth in the words of the false teachers. ἀφ᾽ ἧς 
need not denote a long interval of time (cf. Luke vii. 45). It may 
therefore be possible that the Epistle is addressed to the second 
generation of Christians. Moreover, chap. i. 16-18 is most naturally 
regarded as addressed to those “who have not seen, and yet have 
believed,” and the superior position of the eye-witnesses therein 
implied is an idea that would be most prominent in sub-Apostolic 
times. 

(3) Chap. iii. 8—As an indication of an early date for the Epistle, 
the absence of any millennial significance in this passage has been 
adduced (Bigg, pp. 214, 295). Against this, Mayor (of. cit. cxxvi. 
has pointed out that we learn from Justin Martyr (Dzal., chap. 80) 

ethat there were also many orthodox believers in his time who 
refused to accept the millenial teaching. It may, however, be noted 
that the passage in Justin hardly negatives Dr. Bigg’s conclusion. 
There it is said that ‘“‘ many think otherwise,” 1.6., in opposition to a 
millenial doctrine. In 2 Peter, the context in which the words are 
used is entirely apart from any millenarian notion at all. The sig- 
nificant thing is that 2 Peter, unlike all subsequent writers does not 
employ Psalm xc. 4. in connection with the idea. He is dealing 
with the very verse out of which Chiliasm arose, and he could hardly 
have so completely ignored the opinion unless he had been writing at a 
date previous at least to its later widespread acceptance in the Church. 

At what time the view became common in the Early Church is 
uncertain. In Barnabas xv. 5 we meet with the conception, but 
there is no trace of the doctrine in either 1 Clem., Ignatius, Polycarp, 
the Epistle to Diognetus, or the Didache. Hermas is not uninflu- 
enced by the idea. Innone of the apologists, except Justin, is there 
any trace of Chiliasm. 2 Peter iii. 8, therefore, with its peculiar 
use of Psalm xc. 4 would indicate a date certainly much earlier than 
Justin Martyr (140-161), who refers to the belief as a tenet of the 
orthodox faith, and probably earlier than Barnabas. If the absence 
of reference to millenial doctrine in 1 Clem., Ignatius, and the Didache 
means the same as in 2 Peter, a date at the very end of the first 
century and the very beginning of the second is probable for our 
Epistle. 

(4) Chap. iii. 2.—rav ἀποστόλων ὑμῶν. The writer must be re- 
garded as including himself among the Apostles (cf. 1. 1), and not as 


104 INTRODUCTION 


making any distinction between himself andthem. The phrase need 
not necessarily mean “the Twelve,” but rather missionaries from 
whom the knowledge of the Gospel was first received.! Of these the 
writer is one (i. 16). ἀπόστολος is so used Phil. ii. 25, 2 Cor. viii. 23 
(cf. discussion of term in Harnack, Expansion of Christianity, Bk. 
iii.’ 68. i.). The passage, therefore, does not exclude a date later 
than the Apostolic Age. 

(5) Chap. iii. 16—Two considerations are suggested by this 
reference to St. Paul that have a bearing on the date of the Epistle. 
(a) Paul’s Epistles are included in a body of writings called γραφαί, 
and we have reason to suppose that τὰς λοιπὰς γραφάς probably 
refers to the O.T. Scriptures. (δ) The “ unlearned and unstable” 
distort these Epistles of Paul to their own destruction. Both these 
statements require that the date of the Epistle be postponed so 
as to leave room for them. (a) renders it quite impossible to fix 
a date in the life-time of Peter. The statement implies not neces- 
sarily a collection of Pauline letters such as we have in the Canon 
of the N.T., but the epithet γραφή would be applied if certain letters 
of Paul were accustomed to be read in the churches. That in- 
terpretation would not require a date later than the end of the first 
century. At the same time (b) demands that time must be allowed 
to enable the Pauline Epistles to gain such a position of recognised 
authority in the Church as Scripture that they can be misinterpreted 
by “unlearned and unstable souls”. All these circumstances would 
be met by a date quite early in the second century. 

(6) Chap. ii—The resemblances in this chapter to the Epistle of 
Jude are undoubted. There are parallels in thought and language 
also in Jude 1, 2=2 Peter i. 1,2; Jude 3,2= Peter i. 12; Jude 17-19 
=2 Peter iii. 1-3; Jude 20-25=2 Peter iii. 14-18. Spitta, Zahn, 
and Bigg are among the foremost defenders of the view that 2 Peter 
is prior to Jude. Irresistible arguments, however, may be adduced 
for the opinion that the relationship is the other way. For the 
discussion of the question the reader may be referred to the In- 
troduction to Jude. At the moment we are concerned with the 
question only in so far as it has a bearing on the date of 2 Peter. A 
date not later than a.p. 90 is assigned to Jude by Chase, Mayor, 
Salmon, Plummer, Spitta. The limits 100-180 are accepted by 

1Two conceptions of the term “apostle’’ are found in the early church, 
a wider, based on the Jewish official use of the term, and a narrower, confined 
to the “‘ Twelve”. The two conceptions existed side by side, and “ the natrower 
was successful in making headway against its rival’? (Harnack, Expansion of 
Christianity, i. p. 408). If the wider use is found here, it would amount to an. 
argument for an early date to the epistle. 


INTRODUCTION 105 


Jiilicher and Harnack. The arguments for the second century date 
are examined by Chase (of. cit., pp. 803 f.), and found insufficient.} 

If the date in the last decade of the first century be accepted for 
Jude, 2 Peter must be later; but there is not that evidence of 
advance in the Gnostic views opposed in 2 Peter upon those in Jude 
to warrant our assigning to 2 Peter a date much later than Jude. 

To sum up the internal evidence for the date of 2 Peter, the 
considerations adduced in (3) would fix the terminus ad quem at 
least previous to 140-160, the probable date of Justin, in whose day 
Chiliasm was an orthodox belief. On the other hand, (1), (2), (5) 
would render it possible to regard the Epistle as the product of a 
time not very much later than the apostolic, and perhaps (4) may 
also be regarded as confirmatory in this connexion. The relationship 
to Jude would suggest a date not earlier than a.p. 100. The external 
evidence, as we have seen, would render possible a date not later 
han the first decade of the second century. Perhaps 4.p. 100-115, 
may be tentatively suggested as the extreme limits. 


1A summary of the evidence may here be given :— 

1, πίστις, spoken of in Jude 3-20, as a formulated deposit, is used in practi- 
cally the same way in Gal. i. 23, iii. 23, vi. Io, etc. 

2. In ver. 17 the language need not imply that the apostolic period is long past. 
The mention of oral instruction (ἔλεγον) would quite suit a date in early sub-apostolic 
times, when some of the Apostles were dead and some scattered. 

3. The argument from the use of apocryphal books is invalid. Of the two 
quoted by Jude, Enoch is assigned by most scholars to a date B.c., and the 
Assumption of Moses was probably written within the first thirty years A.D. 

4. The Gnostic views attacked in the Epistle are not necessarily of late date. 


CHAPTER IV. 
RELATION TO 1 PETER. 


It is a very generally accepted result of criticism that the two 
Epistles of Peter are not by the same hand. Jerome (Script. Eccles., 
1), in connexion with 2 Peter, remarked on the “stili cum priore 
dissonantiam”’ (see p. 175). So marked are these differences 
between the two Epistles, that even Spitta and Zahn, who defend 
the authenticity of 2 Peter, are therefore obliged to give up the real 
Petrine authorship of 1 Peter. They admit that 2 Peter is a letter 
from the Apostle’s own hand, and attribute the First Epistle to 
Silvanus, under the direction of the Apostle, in accordance with their 
interpretation of 1 Peter v. 12 (Spitta, of. cit., pp. 530 ff.; Zahn 
Introd. 11., pp. 149 ff.). 

Space does not permit of a full discussion of this question, and 
the reader is referred to the minute and elaborate treatment of 
the subject in Mayor’s edition (pp. Ixviii. ff.). Reference may be 
made briefly to the following points :— 

1. Resemblances in Vocabulary and Style.—(1) Vocabulary— (a) 
χάρις ὑμῖν καὶ εἰρήνη πληθυνθείη, 2 Peter i. 2, 1 Peteri.2; use of καλεῖν, 
2 Peter i. 8 and 1 Peter i. 15, ii. 9, 21, iii. 9, v. 10; with κλῆσιν καὶ 
ἐκλογὴν, 2 Peter i. 10, may be compared the foregoing references 
to use of καλεῖν in 1 Peter, and the use of ἐκλεκτός, 1 Peter i. 1, ii. 4,9; 
θέλημα 2 Peter i. 21, and 1 Peter ii. 15, iii. 17, iv. 2, 19; with ἐν 
ἐπιθυμίαις σαρκὸς ἀσελγείαις cf. πεπορευμένους ἐν ἀσελγείαις, ἐπιθυμίαις 
1 Peter iv. 3; ἐπόπται, 2 Peter i. 16, and ἐποπτεύοντες, 1 Peter ii. 12, 
iii. 2; ἄσπιλοι καὶ ἀμώμητοι, 2 Peter iii. 14, and ἄμωμος καὶ ἄσπιλος, 
1 Peter i. 19; ἀκαταπαύστους ἁμαρτίας, 2 Peter ii. 14, and πέπαυται 
ἁμαρτίας, 1 Peter iv. 1. 

The foregoing resemblances are remarkable as extending to the 
uses of the same words or ideas in similar connexions. The 
following single words may be noted as being largely confined, in 
their use in the N.T. to 1 and 2 Peter :— 


INTRODUCTION 107 


2 Peter. r Peter. Rest of N.T. 
ἀναστροφή. . 2 5 5 
ἀπόθεσις 1 1 0 
ἀρετή eae 3 1 (pl.) 1 
ἀσεβής. . 1 1 6 (3 in Jude.) 
ἀσέλγεια 3 1 6 (1 in Jude.) 
ἄσπιλος. 1 1 2 
προγινώσκω Ι 1 3 


(Ὁ) Including these already mentioned, Mayor, op. cit., pp. Ixix., 
Ixx. gives a list of 100 words common to both Epistles. He also 
gives a list of 369 words occurring in 1 Peter and not in 2 Peter, 
230 words occurring in 2 Peter and not in 1 Peter. 

(c) One remarkable difference is in the word used for the Second 
Advent. In 2 Peter παρουσία (i. 16, iii. 4, 12), in 1 Peter ἀποκάλυψις 
(i. 7, 13, iv. 13) is used. 

The facts contained in (a) are sufficient at least to suggest literary 
dependence between the two Epistles, but (4) and (c) entirely negative 
the possibility that they are by the same hand. 

(2) Style. ‘‘The style of 1 Peter is simple and natural, without 
a trace of self-conscious effort. The style of 2 Peter is rhetorical 
and laboured, marked by a love for striking and startling expressions ”’ 
(Chase, D. B., iii. 812 a). As against this estimate, it may be ques- 
tioned whether the two Epistles are so far apart in style as it is 
usual to say they are. Mayor says, “There can be no doubt that 
the style of 1 Peter is, on the whole, clearer and simpler than that | 
of 2 Peter, but there is not that chasm between them which some/ 
would try to make out” (p. civ.). As regards grammatical similarity, 
he sums up the results of a most learned discussion (chap. iv.) as 
follows: “As to the use of the article, they resemble one another 
more than they resemble any other book of the N.T. Both use the 
genitive absolute correctly. There is no great difference in their use 
of the cases or of the verbs, except that 1 Peter freely employs the 
articular infinitive, which is not found in 2 Peter. The accusative 
with the infinitive is found in both. The accumulation of prepositions 
is also common to both. The optative is more freely used in 1 Peter 
than in 2 Peter. In final clauses 2 Peter conforms to classical 
usage in attaching the subjunctive to iva, while 1 Peter, in one place, 
has the future indicative. 2 Peter is also more idiomatic in the use 
of such elliptical forms as ἕως οὗ, ἐφ᾽ ὅσον, ἀφ᾽ ἧς. On the other hand, 
1 Peter shows special elegance in his use of ὡς in comparisons, and 
emphasises the contrast between the aorist and the present impera- 
tive by coupling τιμήσατε with τιμᾶτε in ii. 7” (pp.civ., cv.). It is 


108 INTRODUCTION 


incumbent on scholars to give every weight to these utterances, 
especially in view of such extreme criticism of the style of 2 Peter 
as that of Dr. E. A. Abbott (Exp., ii., vol. 11.; From Letter to 
Spirit, §§ 1123-1129). 

2. Attitude to the Old Testament.—It has been reckoned by Hort 
(Appendix, Notes on 1 Peter, p. 179) that there are thirty-one 
quotations from the O.T. in 1 Peter as against five in 2 Peter. 
Also, an examination of the quotations in 2 Peter (ii. 2, 22, iii. 8, 
12, 13), and of the references to O.T. history (Noah, ii. 5; Lot, 
ii. 6-9; Balaam, ii. 15-16) show that they are not only much fewer in 
number, but that 2 Peter never formally quotes the O.T., and that 
the actual allusions are of a much less intimate and spiritual char- 
acter than in 1 Peter. Incidentally it may be pointed out (cf. Chase, 
op. cit., p. 813 a) that this is the opposite of what we would expect if 
St. Peter wrote the Epistle to Jewish Christians (so Spitta and Zahn). 

3. Relation to the Pauline Epistles—1 Peter displays a close 
connexion of thought with Romans and Ephesians in particular. 
“The connexion though very close, does not lie on the surface. It is 
shown more by identities of thought and similarity in the structure 
of the two Epistles as wholes than by identities of phrase’’ (Hort, 
r Peter, p. 5). 2 Peter, on the other hand, is extremely non-Pauline 
in thought. The idea of the μακροθυμία of God in chap. ili. might 
easily be the common property of the Christian consciousness. 
Even granting that there were special circumstances in the origin of 
1 Peter, that would largely account for the presence of Pauline 
thought in the mind of St. Peter as he wrote (cf. Chase, D. B., 788, 
789), it cannot be regarded as possible that the difference in the 
circumstances both of writer and readers which we find in 2 Peter 
would lead to such a complete freedom from Pauline influence. 

4, Devotional Expression.—There is a great contrast in devo- 
tional thought and feeling between the two Epistles. It has already 
been noted (pp. 186-9) that the references to the great events in the 
life of Christ are strangely few. The only allusion to His sufferings 
and death is contained in τὸν dyopdcavta αὐτοὺς δεσπότην (ii. 1). The 
only crisis in His life that is mentioned is the Transfiguration. No 
mention is made of the Holy Spirit except as the source of inspira- 
tion of the ancient prophets (i. 21). Prayer is not alluded to. The 
Apostles were essentially witnesses to the Resurrection, but on the 
Resurrection 2 Peter is silent. Instead, the writer guarantees the 
truth of the Apostolic teaching by an appeal to the Transfiguration 
(cf. 1 Peter i. 2, 3, 11, 19-21, ii. 24, iii. 18, 21, 22). 

There is also a striking difference between the two writers in 


INTRODUCTION 109 


their personal attitude and relationship towards Jesus Christ. A 
warmth and intensity of feeling is apparent all through 1 Peter, 
which displays a much more vivid and tender sense of the reality of 
the grace and presence of the Risen Christ in the individual heart 
(cf. i. 8, 18, ii, 9, 21, iv. 12 Ὁ, v. 16) than the second epistle. 
‘The flame of love,” so bright in the first epistle, burns but dimly 
dn the second. 2 Peter contains what Mayor calls ‘reverential 
periphrases,” such as θεία φύσις, θεία δύναμις, μεγαλειότης, μεγαλοπρεπὴς 
δόξα, κυριότης. ἐπίγνωσις, ἐπιγινώσκω are the only words that are used 
of the deepest and most intimate religious experience, communion of 
heart with the Living Christ. It is true that the thoughts of God’s 
long-suffering (iii. 9-15) and His care of the righteous (ii. 9) are full of 
tender meaning, but we do not find in 2 Peter that sense of personal 
relationship to Christ, founded on memories of past, and an actual 
sense of present discipleship, which transfuses the thought of the 
first epistle, and we miss the penitential sense of cleansing through 
the death of Christ so prominent in 1 Peter (cf. 1 Peter i. 18-19, ii. 
21-23). The references to the Risen Lord in 2 Peter are few, and are 
pervaded chiefly by a sense of His majesty (cf. i. 16, ii. 1, 3, 12, 17, 
20, 21, iii. 7, 10, 12). Even where the language is purely hortatory, 
as in 2 Peter, chap. i., the difference of tone and manner compared 
with 1 Peter is quite clearly marked. Thus the religious and devo- 
tional atmospheres in the two Epistles are far apart. Allowance 
must no doubt be made for the varying circumstances under which 
they were written. The one is written to a scattered body of 
Christians who are suffering persecution, and are in special need of 
spiritual comfort and stimulus; the other is directed against the 
immoral influences of false teaching. At the same time external 
circumstances are quite insufficient to account for these fundamental 
differences in the religious attitude of the two writings. Such a 
change could not take place in the history of a single personality, 
unless through some crisis completely revolutionising thought and 
feeling. 


CHAPTER V. 
VOCABULARY AND STYLE OF 2 PETER. 


THE extreme limit of depreciatory criticism of the style of 2 Peter 
is reached in the epithet applied by Dr. E. A. Abbott, (Expositor ii., 
vol. iii.; From Letter to Spirit 1121-1135), who describes it as “ Baboo 
Greek”. The most moderate treatment of the subject is found in 
the article, so often referred to, by Dr. Chase. We may briefly 
summarise the chief points of criticism. 

*1. The large number of words found in 2 Peter, and nowhere else 
in the N.T. The full list may be given: aOeopos,! ἀκατάπαυστος, ἅλω- 
123 ἀστήρικτος,2 αὐχμηρός." 
2 


ats,) 2 ἀμαθής,;Σ ἀμώμητος,23 ἀποφεύγειν,1 3 ἀργεῖν, 
βλέμμα," βόρβορος,᾽ “3 βραδύτης,2 διαυγάζειν, δυσνόητος, ἐγκατοικεῖν," ἑκάσ- 
τοτε,2 8 ἔκπαλαι, ἔλεγξις,. ἐμπαιγμονή, evtpuday,! ἐξακολουθεῖν,} ὃ ἐξέραμα, 
ἐπάγγελμα,2 ἐπόπτης," 25 ἰσότιμος, κατακλύξζειν," ὃ καυσοῦσθαι, κύλισμα, λήθη, 
μεγαλοπρεπής, μέγιστος, 5 μίασμα,1 2 pracpds,! μνήμη, ὃ μυωπάζειν, μῶμος, 
ὀλίγως, ὀμίχλη,: 2 παραφρονία, παρεισάγειν, παρεισφέρειν," ὃ πλαστός," ῥοι- 
ζηδόν, σειρός, στηριγμός,2 8 στοιχεῖον! (in sense of physical elements), 
στρεβλοῦν," 2 ταρταροῦν, ταχινός,3 τεφροῦν, τήκεσθαι, τοιόσδε, τολμητής, Us, ® 
φωσφόρος, ψευδοδιδάσκαλος. 

One or two remarks on the list may be offered. 

(1) Largely’on the ground of the use by 2 Peter of such a re- 
markably long list of ἅπαξ λεγόμενα the vocabulary of 2 Peter has been 
characterised as an “ambitious” one (Chase). It has also been 
described as “bookish,” ** with a strong inclination for striking and 
poetical words. 

It is undoubtedly true that many of the words marked ? are 
found only in the Greek dramatists or historians, but it is rash to 
conclude that at the time 2 Peter was written all of them were still 
poetical words. Moreover, the use of poetical language is not in- 
compatible with the prophetic tone in 2 Peter. The words marked ὃ 
are found in various Papyri, representing the vernacular of daily 


life, in which much of the N.T. was written. It will be noted that 


* Words marked 1 are found in LXX, ? in classical writers, 2 in Papyri (for reff. 
see Comm.). 
** Fg, Moulton, Proleg., pp. 97-8. But cf. note on II. 5 in Comm. 


INTRODUCTION II! 


in four cases the so-called ἅπαξ λεγόμενα of 2 Peter are found both in 
the classics and in the vernacular. This suggests that most ordinary 
of all occurrences in the history of words, the passing of a word 
from the language of literature into the language of common speech. 
Again, the case of words such as ἀμώμητος, ἀργεῖν, etc., taken along 
with the fact that the study of colloquial Greek is in its infancy, 
suggests that caution is required in peremptorily condemning the use 
of certain words in 2 Peter as barbarisms. No less than sixteen 
words in the above list are found in Papyri. 

(2) At the same time it is undoubtedly true that the style of 2 
Peter is often rhetorical, and contains some most successful attempts 
after sonorous effect, (e.g., note the rhythm of ii. 4-9, and cf. the re- 
marks of Mayor, p. lviii. and Bigg, pp. 227 ff.). The writer is himself 
impressed with the majesty of his theme, and it is of great interest 
to note that in some cases he may probably be making use of the 
liturgical language of his day. An inscription has been discovered in 
Stratonicea in Caria, dating from the early imperial period, contain- 
ing a decree of the inhabitants in honour of Zeus Panhemerios and of 
Hekate. Deissmann (Bible Studies, E. Tr., pp. 360 ff.) has pointed 
out one or two most suggestive parallels in the inscription with 2 
Peter i. 3 ff. The phrases τῆς θείας δυνάμεως ἀρετάς, τῶν κυρίων 
Ῥωμαίων αἰωνίου ἀρχῆς, πᾶσαν σπουδὴν εἰσφέρεσθαι, and the superlative 
μεγίστων (θεῶν) occur. In the case of θεία δύναμις, where 2 Peter 
was usually supposed to be employing philosophical language, he 
appears really to be quoting a current religious term, well known 
perhaps to the very readers of his Epistle. With the phrase θείας 
κοινωνοὶ φύσεως (i. 4) may be compared φύσεως κοινωνοῦντες ἀνθρω[πί]νης 
from a religious inscription of Antiochus I. of Kommagene (middle 
of first century B.c.). It is probable, also, that the use of words like 
μεγαλοπρεπής, ταρταροῦν and εὐσέβεια (which also occurs in the Carian 
inscription, and isa common N.T. word); δωρέομαι, ἀρέτη (1. 3), ἐπιχο- 
ρηγεῖν, and phrases like διεγείρειν ἐν ὑπομνήσει may be traced to the 
same liturgical source. 

2. Solecisms.—Chase gives alist of certain expressions in the Epistle 
** which, so far as our knowledge of the language goes, appear to be 
contrary to usage.” These are βλέμμα (ii. 8), καυσοῦσθαι (iii. 10-12), 
μελλήσω (i. 12), μνήμην ποιεῖσθαι (i. 15), μυωπάζεν (i. 9), παρεισφέρειν 
(i. 5), σειρός (ii. 4). For discussion as to the meaning of these see 
the Commentary in loc. That something may be said for their use 
is proved by the remarks of Mayor (pp. Ix. ff.). 

3. Reiteration of Words.—There is a well-marked reiteration of 
words in the vocabulary of 2 Peter, ¢.g., ἐπιχορηγεῖν (i. 5, 11); βέβαιος 


112 INTRODUCTION 


(i. 10, 19); ὑπομιμνήσκειν, ἐν ὑπομνήσει, μνήμην ποιεῖσθαι (i. 12, 13, 15; 
ili, 1); ἐνεχθείσης, ἐνεχθεῖσαν (i. 17, 18); ἀπώλεια (11. 13, iii. 7-16); 
ἐφείσατο (ii. 4, 5); τηρεῖν (ii. 4, 9, 17; iii. 7); στοιχεῖα καυσούμενα (iii. 
10, 12). 

Chase asserts that “the extraordinary list of repetitions ” stamps 
the vocabulary as “ poor and inadequate ” (of. cit., 808). In reply, it 
may be urged, (1) This sweeping condemnation is scarcely consistent 
with the occasional use of very rare words on the part of the writer. 
(2) Reiteration may arise from other causes than a limited vocabu- 
lary. It may arise ‘‘either from a liking for resonant sounds, or from 
a desire to give emphasis by the use of line upon line, or from both”’ 
(Mayor, p. lvii. f.). (3) A similar habit of repeating words is found in 
1 Peter (cf. Bigg, pp. 226 f.). 

The foregoing remarks on the vocabulary and style of 2 Peter are 
necessary and timely, in view of the current tendency to depreciate 
these. Many.of the phrases in 2 Peter have found a permanent 
place in the religious language of the Christian Church. It would 
be rash to acquit the writer entirely of all faults of style that have 
been attributed to him, but his ordinary intelligence must at least 
be vindicated. Chap. iii., “On the Style of 2 Peter,” of Mayor’s 
edition is worthy of close study, as tending to restore the style of 
2 Peter to that respect which enabled it to be studied in the time 
of Aurelius, though not regarded as canonical, along with other 
Scriptures, ‘‘as it appears profitable to many”. 


CHAPTER VI." 
CIRCUMSTANCES OF WRITING. 


1. Readers—To whom was the Epistle written? The crucial 
passage in this connexion is ili. 1, where the Epistle referred to is 
most naturally understood to be 1 Peter. The objection is urged by 
Spitta, Zahn, and more recently by Mayor, that the description of 
the contents in ili. 1, 2 is inapplicable to 1 Peter. Yet in 1 Peter i. 
10-12 we have almost an exact parallel to τῶν προειρημένων ῥημάτων 
ὑπὸ τῶν ἁγίων προφητῶν, and 1 Peter is full of reminiscences of the 
teaching and example of Jesus (rijs . . . ἐντολῆς τοῦ κυρίου καὶ σωτῆρος) 
(cf. 1 Peter i. 15, 16, ii. 13-17, 23, etc.; cf. also ii. 1, τοῦτο δέ ἐστιν 
τὸ ῥῆμα τὸ εὐαγγελισθὲν εἰς ὑμᾶς). The ethical difficulty caused by this 
interpretation of the reference, if the two Epistles are not by the 
same author, is no greater than that aroused by the use of the 
apostolic name in i. 1 (see Introd., pp. 97-99). | Moreover, we have no 
reason to expect anything but a statement in iii. 1 of what the two 
Epistles have in common. ‘The words do not exclude the supposition 
that their contents differ in many respects. The readers, then, 
are, in general, those mentioned in 1 Peter i. 1, viz., Christian 
communities of Asia Minor. 

Mayor (op. cit., pp. cxxxvil. ff.) has again defended the view that 
2 Peter is written to the Roman Church.) He founds his 
argument on 2 Peter ili. 15, καθὼς καὶ ὁ ἀγαπητὸς ἡμῶν Παῦλος 
ἔγραψεν ὑμῖν, holding that καθώς must be explained by the 
immediately preceding admonition, tod κυρίου ἡμῶν μακροθυμίαν 
σωτηρίαν ἡγεῖσθε, which is more distinctly stated in Romans ii. 
4, ili. 25, 26, ix. 22, than elsewhere. Various objections may 
be urged against this view. (1) It is extremely doubtful whether 
the reference καθώς can be thus narrowed, so as to include only 
ver. 14. The introduction of the comparison with Paul seems 
to arise from a desire to show that in general there is no dis- 
crepancy between the Petrine and the Pauline teaching. (2) Even 
although the Epistle to the Romans is meant, it would be no proof 
that 2 Peter was written to the Roman Church, as it is evident from 


1So Grotius, Dietlein. 


114 INTRODUCTION 


ἐν πάσαις ἐπιστολαῖς, and τὰς λοιπὰς γραφὰς (ver. 16), that the Epistles 
of Paul had reached the rank of γραφαί, and were known to the 
Church at large. (3) Even if the narrower reference of καθὼς is 
adopted, the idea of μακροθυμία is echoed also in 1 Corinthians and 
Thessalonians (1 Cor. xv. 2; 2 Thess. ii. 16). If the wider reference 
is taken, almost any of the Pauline Epistles may be meant, as the 
doctrine of God’s free grace is reflected in many of them. It is also, 
of course, quite possible that the reference may be to a lost Epistle.! 

That practically the same class of readers as in 1 Peter is meant, 
is confirmed by τοῖς ἰσότιμον ἡμῖν λαχοῦσιν πίστιν (i. 1).2 The phrase 
may be regarded as referring in general to the isolated position of 
the readers, who are made to feel, as in 1 Peter i. 1, 2, that they 
too are recipients of the grace of God and objects of His special 
choice. The words in 2 Peter may well be a succinct expression of 
the idea in the opening verses of the First Epistle. In the one 
case the readers are suffering persecution; in the other, they are 
being led astray and harassed by false teaching. In both cases 
the words carry a message of comfort. 

The question may be raised whether i. 16, ἐγνωρίσαμεν ὑμῖν τὴν τοῦ 
κυρίου... δύναμιν καὶ παρουσίαν, implies that the Apostle himself had 
preached to these readers, and whether this is compatible with an 
Asiatic community as recipients of the letter. In 1 Peter the Apostle 
does not appear to have been personally acquainted with his readers 
or to have himself laboured among them, and there is no trace in the 
career of St. Peter of an Asiatic ministry. The words, however, do 
not necessarily imply that Peter had himself preached the Gospel to 
those who are addressed. The plural may be used of a single person 
(cf. Moulton, Proleg., p. 86). The mask would seem to be thrown off 
for the moment, and the actual personality of the unknown writer 
to obtrude itself in this pseudonymous Epistle. That he should 
have taken no special pains to prevent this, is itself an indication 
of good faith on the writer’s part, and of his lack of any intention 
to deceive. He himself is the preacher. 

The general character of the address in 2 Peter is undoubted. 
The Epistle is written to a wide class of Christians readers 


1 Hofmann (vii. 2, 113 ff.) argues that the reference is to Ephesians. An im- 
portant discussion of whole question is found in Spitta (pp. 286-88). 

2 In connexion with these words, it has been argued whether they indicate Jewish 
or Gentile Christians. The presumption is in favour of the latter (see Commentary 
in loc.). The use of a word like ταρταρώσας (ii. 4) indicates a Hellenic atmosphere 
of thought, and the phrase in ii, 20, ἀποφυγόντες τὰ μιάσματα τοῦ κόσμου seems 
most applicable to Gentiles. 


INTRODUCTION 115 


who are not recent converts (i. 12), “ein fiir weite Kreise der 
Kirche bestimmtes pastorales Rundschau” (Spitta, op. cit., p. 483). 
1 Peter also is general in its destination. 2 Peter may well be 
addressed to the same localities as 1 Peter, although to a later 
generation of Christians, under different circumstances. This would 
also supply a motive for the use of the Apostle’s name. 

2. False Teachers.—The description of the false teachers given in 
chap. ii. is taken in the main from the Epistle of Jude. It ought to 
be noted, however, that the object in view in the two Epistles is 
somewhat different. Jude is, above all, a polemic against the false 
teaching. 2 Peter is written with a view to confirming the faith of 
the Christian communities in the face of the delayed Parousia. 

, The false teachers in 2 Peter “have brought a new idea into the 
field... . They cast doubt on the Christian eschatological expectation 

. appealing in support of their view to a deeper knowledge of 
Christ (i. 2, 3, iii. 18, cf. i. 16-18), a particular conception of the O.T. 
(i. 20, iii. 16), and certain Pauline positions (iii. 15 f., cf. ii. 19)” (Von 
Soden, of. cit., p. 194). They are ‘‘ mockers”’ (ἐμπαῖκται) who say, ποῦ 
ἐστὶν ἡ ἐπαγγελία τῆς παρουσίας αὐτοῦ ; (iii. 4). In this fact, we may 
find a partial explanation of the use made by 2 Peter of Jude. He 
makes use of an authoritative description of their real character, 
making certain changes dictated by his own views as to the use of 
apocryphal books (e.g., omission of story of Michael), and by the 
special circumstances of those he addresses. . 

A remarkable circumstance in the language employed is that the 
writer speaks at one time of the false teachers as about to come 
(ii. 1 f., iii. 3), at another as though they were already active (ii. 11, 
12, 17 f., 20, iii. 5, 11. 16). All such explanations as that the writer 
projects himself into the future, and from that point of view vividly 
regards future events as actually happening; or that he is at one 
time thinking of communities where the ψευδοδιδάσκαλοι are actually 
at work, and at another of communities where their influence has 
not yet penetrated, may be set aside. The simplest explanation 
seems to be that again the writer, when he speaks of them in the 
present tense, throws off the prophetic mask, and depicts what he 
knew was actually happening.' 

Do the characteristics mentioned in this Epistle point to a 
Gnostic sect? It has been pointed out that there is one important 
difference between the libertines of Jude’s Epistle and those of 


1 Henkel suggests that the False Teachers, who are active in other communities, 
are regarded as presenting only an imminent possible danger to the readers of 2 Peter 
(Der Zw. B. des Apostelfiirsten Petrus, p. 37 ff.). 


116 INTRODUCTION 


2 Peter (cf Chase, op. cit., iii, 811). In the former, not so much 
\eaching as practice, was in question, while, in 2 Peter, they are called 
ψευδοδιϑάσκαλοι, and seem to have been engaged in the active propa- 
gation of false doctrine. The use of γνώσις in i. 5 f. can scarcely be 
without reference to that intellectualism, with its hidden wisdom, 
and exclusive mysteries, so characteristic of Gnosticism (cf. Light- 
foot, Colossians, pp. 73-113). The word ἐπόπτης (i. 16) is a Gnostic 
term meaning one who has been initiated into the mystery. Jude, 
on the other hand, seems to feel that the movement. he combats is also 
doctrinal in its import; for he urges his readers ‘‘ to contend for the 
faith once delivered to the saints ” (ver. 3), and the heresy he opposes 
must have had a certain materialistic basis (κυριότητα δὲ ἀθετοῦσιν, 
δόξας δὲ βλασφημοῦσιν, ver. 8). There is also implied a certain doctrinal ᾿ 
process in the words, χάριτα μετατιθέντες εἰς ἀσέλγειαν καὶ τὸν μόνον 
δεσπότην καὶ κύριον ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν ἀρνούμενοι (ver. 4). Thus, in 
both cases, the readers are warned against what was really a matter 
both of life and of doctrine, and the situation in 2 Peter need not 
necessarily imply a stage at least much later in the development of 
the false teaching. In these Epistles it can scarcely be doubted that 
we are in the presence of an incipient Gnosticism, and the two 
directions in which the Gnostic tendency led, viz., Intellectualism 
and Antinomianism, are clearly marked. On this latter aspect, the 
emphasis is laid, not only in the Epistles, but in the N.T. generally. 
The new movement caused great anxiety to the leaders of the 
Church, owing chiefly to its immoral tendency. For long the 
heretics were in communion with the Christian Church, and it was 
not until the second century that the cleavage widened out to its 
true limits (cf. E. F. Scott, Apologetic of the N.T., pp. 146 ff.). These 
false teachers in Jude and 2 Peter were partakers in the rites of the 
Christian Church (Jude 12; 2 Peter ii. 13). Incidentally, it may be 
mentioned that their description in 2 Peter does not in itself warrant 
a date for its composition in the second century, and certainly not a 
date so much later than Jude, as is usually supposed. 

2 Peter, then, gives us in general a picture of the prevalence of 
Antinomian heresy, which has as its results the corruption of morals, 
and a certain materialistic tendency which led to disbelief in the 
Person of Christ (ii. 1), and a denial of the ethical nature of God 
(iii. 8, 9; cf. also Philipp. iii. 18 f). 2 Peter is throughout eminently 
ethical in its tone. Religion and life are inseparably connected, ὡς 
πάντα ἡμῖν τῆς θείας δυνάμεως αὐτοῦ τὰ πρὸς ζωὴν καὶ εὐσέβειαν δεδωρημένης 
διὰ τῆς ἐπιγνώσεως τοῦ καλέσαντος ἡμᾶς (i. 8). The true γνῶσις must 
contain ethical qualities (1. 6). The Christian must take pains “to 


INTRODUCTION 117 


make his calling and election sure” by godliness of life (i. 10). 
We are not, however, left without traces of the doctrinal position 
of these false teachers. The Gnostic position which demanded 
yvaois, or a hidden wisdom which leads to perfection, is tacitly 
opposed in the use of the word ἐπίγνωσις, which is used by St. Paul 
to denote “complete knowledge " or “ saving knowledge” (cf. 1 Cor. 
xiii. 12; Philem. 6). Mayor suggests (of. cit., p. 171) that ἐπίγνωσις 
came into use to distinguish the “ living knowledge of the true believer 
from the spurious γνῶσις which had then begun to ravage the Church”. 
The true ἐπίγνωσις carries with it “all that is needed for life and godli- 
ness” (i. 3). These Gnostics evidently held that Revelation in itself 
was incomplete. Those, however, who possess ἐπίγνωσις are made 
θείας κοινωνοὶ φύσεως, a phrase which originates in a philosophic at- 
mosphere, and no doubt reflects a sense of opposition to the pure 
intellectualism of these false teachers, who would claim to be κοινωνοὶ 
θείας φύσεως by means of wisdom or γνώσις alone. τυφλός ἐστιν 
μυωπάζων (i. 9) is a reference to the darkness which was mistaken 
for light, because the γνώσις that accompanied it was so unethical 
(cf. the whole passage, i. 5-9). σεσοφισμένοις μύθοις (i. 16) refers to those 
fictions connected with the emanation of zeons, so characteristic of 
the Gnostic system (cf. 1 Tim. i. 4, iv. 7; 2 Tim. iv. 4; Tit. i. 14), by 
virtue of which the Person of Christ was regarded as the emanation 
of an zon, in union with a human body. In contrast to this idea, 
the writer claims that the Apostles were émémra: . . . τῆς ἐκείνου 
μεγαλειότητος. The Voice proclaims Him to be actually 6 υἱός pou ὃ 
ἀγαπητός pou (i. 17). What seems to be a denial of the Person and 
Work of Christ is referred to in i. 1 τὸν ἀγοράσαντα αὐτοὺς δεσπότην 
ἀρνούμενοι. πλαστοῖς λόγοις (fictitious words) of i. 3 may be compared 
with σεσοφισμένοις μύθοις Of i. 16. κυριότητος καταφρονοῦντας (ii. 10), 
δόξας οὐ τρέμουσιν (ii. 11) evidently cannot refer to any denial of 
human authority, but rather to sceptical views regarding the in- 
fluence of spiritual powers, good or evil, upon the life of the indivi- 
dual. Such a belief was part of the orthodox Jewish thought of the 
time (see Commentary in loc.). ἐλευθερίαν... ἐπαγγελλόμενοι (ii. 19) 
may be set alongside the passage dealing with the misuse and mis- 
interpretation of the Pauline doctrine of free grace (iii. 16), which 
.provided the theoretic basis for Antinomianism. These false teachers 
questioned the truth of the Parousia expectation (iii. 4) on the ground 
(1) of the uniformity of nature (πάντα οὕτως διαμένει an’ ἀρχῆς κτίσεως) 
which is met by the argument that the heavens and the earth were 
created by the word of God, and that the earth has already been 
flooded by the same divine agency (iii. 5-7). (2) The indestructibility 
VOL. V 8 


118 INTRODUCTION 


of matter, against which it is asserted that in the day of the Lord 
οἱ οὐρανοὶ ῥοιζηδὸν παρελεύσονται, στοιχεῖα δὲ καυσούμενα λυθήσεται (iii. 
10). Finally, we are told that the false teachers use the Scriptures 
of the O.T. as a basis for their heretical teaching (iii. 16). 

It is thus apparent that in 2 Peter, far more than in Jude, the 
doctrine as well as the life of the false teachers is in question. 
Their ethical character is described in words largely borrowed from 
Jude, and in no measured terms. They speak evil of the way of 
truth (11. 2); make merchandise of their followers (ii. 3); are fleshly 
and lustful (ii. 10-12); practise a vulgar hedonism (ii. 13) ; defile the 
love-feasts by their presence (13) ; deceive the hopes of their followers, 
like waterless fountains (16). They are Christians in name, steal 
into the Church without disclosing their impious views (ii. 1, 20, 21), 
and are boastful and irreverent (ii. 10, 18). 

The question arises whether these false teachers can be identified 
with any known heretical sect. Some critics have sought to dis- 
tinguish between the libertines of chap. ii. and the mockers of 
chap. iii., but there is really no difficulty in identifying the two.1 
The denial of the Parousia by the mockers is really the outcome of 
a materialistic philosophy, and the denial of a future judgment would 
have the tendency to emancipate from all moral restraint. “There 
may have been shades of difference between them; some, perhaps, 
had a philosophy, and some had not; but in the eyes of a Christian 
Preacher, judging the party as a whole by its practical results, they 
would all seem to wear the same livery” (Bigg, op. cit., p. 239, cf. 
Henkel, of. cit., p. 37). 

Harnack, who holds that Jude was written 100-130, suggests that 
the attack in that Epistle is aimed at some of the older forms of 
Gnosticism, among which he mentions the Nicolaitans. This sect is 
known to have had considerable influence in Asia Minor, and is 
mentioned by name in Rev. ii. 6, 15, in the Epistles to Ephesus and 
to Pergamum. In the case of the latter Church they are represented 
as existing side by side, and probably as identical with a sect of 
« Balaamites” (ii. £4). No doubt the same sect is accused of immo- 
rality in the Epistle of Thyatira (ii. 20). In 2 Peter ii. 15, 16 the 
example of Balaam is adduced as a parallel to the conduct of the 
false teachers, and it would appear that the name of Balaamites was 
given as a nickname to the Nicolaitans. Irenzeus (iii.,c. 1) tells us 
that the Nicolaitans held the doctrine of two Gods—the God who 
created the world, and the Rather of Jesus; that an zon descended 
upon Jesus, and again returned into the Pleroma before the Cruci- 


1Cf. Henkel, of. cit., pp. 21 ff., where the question is fully discussed. 


INTRODUCTION 119 


fixion. The language of 2 Peter iii. 5-9, relative to the creation and 
the present government of the world, through the long-suffering of 
the Creator, might well have in view some such doctrine as this. The 
accusation, also, of distorting the Scriptures of the O.T. (iii. 16) 
would also be explained, as also the statement in Jude 4 and 
2 Peter ii. 1 about the heretics’ denial of Christ. It is probable that 
these views were common to the Nicolaitans along with other early 
Gnostic sects, such as the followers of Simon Magus (cf. Mayor, op. 
cit., pp. clxxviil. ff.). } 

On the intellectual side, Gnosticism originated in a compromise 
with Greek thought, and an attempt to adapt the Christian teaching 
to the current philosophy.» It is probable that, on the side of con- 
duct, the immoralities that are so vividly denounced in Jude and 2 
Peter were due to a similar compromise with the customs and ideas 
of the Graeco-Roman society of the day. The Nicolaitan teaching, 
as described in Rev. ii., was “ evidently an attempt to effect a reason- 
able compromise with the established usages of Graco- Roman 
society, and to retain as many as possible of those usages in the 
Christian system of life. It affected most of all the educated and 
cultured classes in the Church, those who had most temptation to 
retain as much as possible of the established social ideas and customs 
of the Greco-Roman world, and who by their more elaborate educa- 
tion had been most fitted to take a somewhat artificial view of life, 
and to reconcile contradictory principles in practical conduct through 
subtle philosophical reasoning’? (Ramsay, The Letters to the Seven 
Churches, pp. 337 ff.). 

It had evidently become the custom in the Early Church to use 
the most unsparing language in denouncing these Gnostic errors. 
Both in Revelation and in Jude, the language is violent, and 2 Peter 
deals with the false teachers in the same temper. This may render 
it difficult, at the present day, to understand the exact theoretic 
position of a sect like the Nicolaitans, and it is a well-known fact 
that certain philosophic positions in religion, adopted and advocated 
by men who are themselves of blameless life, may really lead in the 
case of weaker followers to great moral laxity. If we consider the 
picture of Grzeco-Roman society drawn by St Paul in Romans i., it 
is not to be wondered at that these heresies, which led to such 
moral compromises, should be vigorously denounced by the Christian 
teacher. Nothing else “could have saved the infant Church from 
melting away into one of those vague and ineffective schools of philo- 
sophic ethics. ... An easy-going Christianity could never have 
survived; it could not have conquered and trained the world; only 


120 INTRODUCTION 


the most convinced, resolute, almost bigoted adherence to the most 
uncompromising interpretations of its own principles could have 
gained the Christians the courage and self-reliance that were needed ” 
(Ramsay, op. cit., ibid.). 

3. Place of Writing.—On this topic, there is very little ground 
for judgment beyond vague conjecture. Chase favours the view that 
2 Peter is of Egyptian origin. He founds his opinion (1) on the 
supposition that the Apocalypse of Peter and 2 Peter belong to the 
same school, (2) that Clement of Alexandria appears to have placed 
the two documents side by side, and commented on them together 
in his Hypotyposeis, (3) certain resemblances in thought and word 
with Philo and Clement of Alexandria (op. cit., p. 816 f.). Jiilicher 
(Introd., E. Tr., p. 239) suggests that the Epistle originated either 
in Egypt or in Palestine. Palestine is selected on the ground that 
the Epistle is directed against one of the earlier and less known 
Gnostic sects which flourished in that country or in Syria. Deiss- 
mann, on the basis of the Stratonicean inscription already quoted 
(op. cit., pp. 367 f.) inclines to the view that the local colouring of 
the Epistle belongs to Asia Minor. He awaits the result of further 
inquiry “how far its peculiar vocabulary has points of contact with 
that of literary sources (of the imperial period) from Egypt, or Asia 
Minor, including those of the papyri and the inscriptions”. There 
can be little doubt that the readers are in Asia Minor, but does not 
the form of address, τοῖς ἰσότιμον ἡμῖν λαχοῦσιν πίστιν, point to a writer 
at some distance from his readers, though well acquainted with their 
circumstances? (cf. p. 114). 


LITERATURE. 


Friederich Spitta. Der zweite Brief des Petrus und der Brief des $udas. 1885. 

H. v. Soden. Hand-Commentar Zum N.T.., vol. iii., 1892. 

F. H. Chase. Art. 2 Peter in Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible., vol. iii., 1900. 

Charles Bigg. ‘A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Epistles of St. 
Peter and St. Jude (International Critical Commentary). 1901. 

J. B. Mayor. The Epistle of St. ude and the Second Epistle of St. Peter. 1907. 

Amongst older commentaries of the present century referred to are those of 
Alford (ed. 1898), Hofmann (1875), Huther (in Meyer, 1852. E. Tr., 1881), A. 
Wiesinger (in Olshausen, Bibelwerk, 1862), Dietlein (1851). 

The general question of authenticity is discussed in the following :— 

Salmon’s Introduction, pp. 481, ff. 1894. 

Jiilicher’s Introduction, E. Tr., 1904, pp. 232 ff. 

Zahn’s Introduction, E. Tr., 1909, vol. ii., pp. 134 ff. 

B. Weiss. Studien und Kritiken, 1866, pp. 256 ff. 

Grosch. Die Echtheit des zweiten Briefes Petri, 1889. 


INTRODUCTION 121 


McGiffert. History of Christianity in the Apostolic Age, 1897, pp. 600 ff. 

Sanday. Inspiration, 1893, pp. 346 ff., 382 ff. 

E. A. Abbott. Expositor, Jan.-March, 1882. ‘ From Letter to Spirit,” §§ 1τ2τ- 
1135. 

Karl Henkel. Der zweite Brief des Apostelfirsten Petrus, gepriift auf seine 
Echtheit. (From R. C, Standpoint), 1904. 


ABBREVIATIONS OF REFERENCES TO PAPYRI AND INSCRIPTIONS. 


P. Amh. The Amherst Papyri, edd. B. P. Grenfell and Α. 5. Hunt. (Lon- 
don, 1900-01.) 

P. Fay. Fayiim Towns and their Papyri, edd. B. P. Grenfell, A. 5. Hunt 
and Ὁ. G. Hogarth (Egyptian Exploration Fund. London, 1900.) 

P. Fior. Pafiri Fiorentini, ed. G. Vitelli. (Milan, 1905-06.) 

P. Gen. Les Papyrus de Genéve,1. Papyrus Grecs, ed. J. Nicole. (Genéve, 
1896-1900.) 

P. Grenf. I. An Alexandrian Erotic Fragment and other Greek Papyri, chiefly 
Ptolemaic, ed. B. P. Grenfell. (Oxford, 1896.) II. New Classical Fragments and 
other Greek and Latin Papyri, edd. B. P. Grenfell and A. 5. Hunt. (Oxford, 1897.) 

P. Hib. The Hibeh Papyri 1., edd. Grenfell and Hunt. (Egyptian Explora-— 
tion Fund. London, 1906.) 

P. Lond. Greek Papyri in British Museum, 3 vols. (London, 1893, 1898, 1907.) 

P. Oxy. The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, edd. Grenfell and Hunt. (Egyptian Ex- 
ploration Fund. London, 1898, 1899, 1903, 1904.) 

P. Par. Paris Papyri in Notices et Extraits, xviii., ii., ed. Brunet de Presle. 
(Paris, 1865.) 

P. Petr. Flinders Petrie Papyri in Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy, 
“Cunningham Memoirs ”’ (Nos. viii., ix., xi.), 3 vols. (Dublin, 1891-1893.) 

P. Tebt. The Tebtunis Papyri, 2 vols. (University of California Publica- 
tions. London, 1902, 1907.) 

B.G.U. Griechische Urkunden, from the Berlin Museum. 

C.I.A. Corpus Inscriptionum Atticarum. Berlin, 1873- 

O.G.LS.  Orientis Graeci Inscriptiones Selectae, ed, W. Dittenberger, 2 
vols. (Leipzig, 1903-05.) 

For the references to Papyri I am indebted to the ‘Lexical Notes from the 
Papyri,” appearing in Expositor, 1908-9, by Rev. Professor J. H. Moulton, D.D., 
D.Lit., and the Rev. George Milligan, D.D., and to private communications from 
these scholars. 


OTHER ABBREVIATIONS. 


ZNTW. Zeitschrift fiir die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft, herausgegeben 
von Erwin Preuschen. 

MME. Notes from the Papyri in Expositor, 1908, by Professor Moulton and 
Dr. Milligan. 

Moulton Proleg. Grammar of New Testament Greek, vol. i. Prolegomena by 
Professor J. H. Moulton. 

Abbott, J.G. Johannine Grammar by Edwin A. Abbott. 

WM. Winer’s Grammar of N.T. Greek, 3rd editien, by W. F. Moulton. 

H.D.B. Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible (5 vols.). 













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ΠΕΤΡΟΥ ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ B. 


I. τ. ΣΥΜΕΩΝ: Πέτρος δοῦλος καὶ ἀπόστολος Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ τοῖς 


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1 Συμεων ΑΚΕΡ syrr., Treg., Τί. WH™; Σιμων B, vulg., sah., boh., WH. 


CuHaPTERI. Vv. 1-2. The Greeting. 
“Simeon Peter, slave and apostle of 
Jesus Christ, to those who have obtained 
a faith of equal honour with our own, 
through the justice of our God and 
Saviour Jesus Christ. Grace and peace 
be multiplied unto you in the saving 
knowledge of our Lord.” 

Ver. 1. The form Συμέων is only once 
used elsewhere of Peter in Acts xv. 14. 
τοῖς k.t.A. The question as to who are 
the actual recipients of the letter, is 
matter for discussion in the Introduction 
(chap. vi. 1). The presumption is in 
favour of a body of non-Jewish Christians. 
ἡμῖν. probably means, in accordance 
with its use elsewhere in the chapter, 
the whole Christian community to which 
the writer belongs (see Introd. p. 49). 
ἰσότιμον. It is doubtful whether igor. 
means “like in honour” or “like in 
value”. Both meanings are found (c/. 
Mayor, p. 80). We may compare the 
sense of τιμή in v. 17 (see note), 
where the sense is clearly of an honour 
conferred (cf. τ Peter i. 7), which would 
suggest the same meaning here. ἐν 
δικαιοσύνῃ . . - Χριστοῦ. ἐν is instru- 
mental,. Sux. has the sense of “ justice’’ 
or ‘‘impartiality,”’ and is opposed to 
προσωπολημψία. God is no respecter 
of persons. There is no distinction in 
His sight between the faith of an eye- 
witness, and the faith of those ‘ who 
have notseen”’. With this non-theologi- 
cal sense of 8x. cf. ἄδικος in Hebrew 
vi. 10; alsor Johni.g. Θεοῦ refers to 
Christ, cf. John xx. 28. σωτῆρος, a title 
used by the Emperor. ‘‘ Familiarity with 
the everlasting apotheosis that flaunts 
itself in the papyri and inscriptions of 
Ptolemaic and Imperial times, lends 
strong support to Wendland’s conten- 
tion (ZNTW, pp. 335 ff.) that Chris- 


tians from the latter part of i. A.D. 
onward, deliberately assumed for their 
Divine Master the phraseology that was 
impiously arrogated to themselves by 
some of the worst of men”’ (i.e., the 
Emperors). Moulton, Proleg. p. 84 (cf. 
Spitta, p. 523; Chase, D. B. iii. 796). 
πίστιν ἐν Sux. can hardly be taken to- 
gether (cf. Eph. 1. 15, 1 Tim. iii. 13), as 
the relation of the believer to Christ in 
this epistle is rather that of γνῶσις or 
ἐπίγνωσις (cf. v. 2). (Cf. Zahn. Introd. 
ii. pp. 218-9). 

Ver. 2. χάρις - - - πληθυνθείη. : the 
same form οἱ salutation as in 1 Pet. 
i. 2. ἐν ἐπιγνώσει τοῦ Κυρίου ἡμῶν. 
(For history οἵ ἐπίγνωσις see Mayor's 
note, pp. 171 ff. ; Robinson’s Excursus in 
Ephesians.) ἐπίγνωσις in this epistle 
corresponds to πίστις in the Pauline 
sense (Spitta, p. 522). In Rom. i. 21 
γνόντες is used οἱ the imperfect know- 
ledge of God possessed by the heathen 
world, and in v. 28 he contrasts it with the 
Christian or perfect knowledge of God. 
(καθὼς οὐκ ἐδοκίμασαν τὸν Θεὸν ἔχειν 
ἐν ἐπιγνώσει) Cf. τ Cor. xiii. 12, Col. 
ig. “ ἐπίγνωσις, involving the complete 
appropriation of all truth and the unre- 
served acquiescence in God’s will, is the 
goal and crown of the believer’s course” 
(Lightfoot, note on Col.i.g). Cf. Introd. 
p- 117; note ν. 8; Paget, Spirit of Dis- 
cipline, pp. 112 ff. ἐπίγνωσις implies a 
more intimate and personal relationship 
than γνῶσις. It would be a useful word, 
seeing that γνῶσις had become associated 
with Gnosticism, then incipient in the 
Church. Mayor quotes Clem. Alex. Strom. 
i. p. 372, and δ ἐγ.» vi., p. 759, where κατ᾽ 
ἐπίγνωσιν is twice opposed to κατὰ 
περίφασιν ( = ona broad general view, 
cf. Mayor’s note, p. 213). Grace and peace 
are multiplied in and through this more 


124 


> ’ lel , ε ~ 1 
a1 Cor. iv. ἐπιγνώσει TOU κυρίου ἡμῶν, 


18, Xen 


4. M 
Eee 


lov θεου και Inoov tov κυριου ἡμων MSS. generally, Ti., Treg., WH; 
του Beov kat Inoov P, vulg., Minusc., 69, 137, 163, Spitta, Zahn., 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ B Ι. 


3. "ὡς πάντα ἡμῖν τῆς θείας Suvd- 


Cyr. δ, 3 pews αὐτοῦ τὰ πρὸς ζωὴν kal εὐσέβειαν δεδωρημένης διὰ τῆς ἐπι- 


om. 
Nestle. A 


strong argument in favour of omission is the fact that consistently throughout the 


epistle Jesus alone appears as the object of ἐπιγνωσις or yvwots. 


Additional 


confirmation is the use of avrov (sing.) in v. 3. 


intimate heart knowledge of Jesus Christ, 
in contrast to a mere barren γνῶσις. 

Vv. 3, 4. The Promises and their 
Source. “ Inasmuch as His Divine Power 
has granted us all things that are needed 
for life and piety, by means of the per- 
sonal knowledge of One who called 
us by the impression of his own glory 
and excellency; and through this glory 
and excellency have been granted pro- 
mises that are precious to us and 
glorious, in order that, by means of 
these, ye might be partakers of the 
Divine Nature, escaping the corruption 
that is in the world owing to lust.’ 

Throughout this passage, the contrast 
between ἡμῖν, ἡμᾶς, and 2 p. plur. in 
γένησθε (ver. 4) must be preserved. ἡμῖν 
implies the apostolic circle, who, by 
virtue of their own experience of the 
δόξα and ἀρετή of Christ, are able to 
transmit to these readers certain pro- 
mises “precious to us, and glorious.” 
(So Spitta, Van Soden). 

Ver. 3. τῆς θείας δυνάμεως is origin- 
ally a philosophic term (Plato, Jon. 
534 C., Arist. Pol. vii. 4) cf. τὸ θεῖον as 
used by St. Paul in speaking to philos- 
ophers at Athens (Acts xvii. 29). The sub- 
ject is Christ (cf. δύναμις κυρίου, Luke x. 
17; 1 Cor. v. 4; 2 Cor. xii. 9; and v. 16, 
of this chapter). The phrase θεία 
δύναμις is contained in an inscription 
of Stratonicea in Caria in honour of 
Zeus Panhemerios and Hekate, belong- 
ing to the early Imperial period. 2 
Peter would thus be availing himself of 
one of “the familiar forms and forrmhule 
οἵ religious emotion’ (Deissmann, Bible 
Studies, p. 367). αὐτοῦ is taken as re- 
ferring to Κυρίου in ver. 2, which 
would confirm the reading adopted. 
πάντα. .. τὰ πρὸς ζωὴν καὶ εὐσέ- 
βειαν. ζωή is the new life that belongs 
to believers in Christ. εὐσέβεια is also 
found in the inscription quoted above. 
This word and its cognates are found 
in N.T. only in Acts, this Epistle, and 
in the Pastoral Epistles. They are also 
common in inscriptions of Asia Minor, 
and were apparently familiar terms in the 


religious language of the Imperial period. 
In εὐσέβεια, the emphasis of meaning lies 
towards “ godliness”’ in its practical, rather 
than its devotional aspect, z.e., what God 
requires of man “pious conduct”’, In 1 
Tim. iii, 16 Christ is spoken of as “ the 
secret of piety ” (τὸ τῆς εὐσεβείας μυστή- 
ριον). The conjunction of the two ideas 
ζωή and εὐσέβεια is significant. Religion 
does not narrow, but expand the pro- 
vince of life. The life in Christ is 
not “a little province of peculiar emo- 
tion... . If we fear that it may lose 
itself in the vast and often lawless uni- 
verse of life beneath, the danger is to be 
averted not by wilfully contracting it 
within a narrower field, but by seeking 
greater intensity of life in deeper and 
more submissive communion with the 
Head Himself in the heavens’? (Hort, 
The Way, the Truth, and the Life, 
ΒΡ. 047): δεδωρημένης: (=“‘ gifted” or 
‘‘sranted”’). This word and its cog- 
nates always carry a certain regal sense 
describing an act of large-handed 
generosity. Cf. Mark xv. 45 of the 
giving by Pilate of the body of Jesus to 
Joseph; John iv. 10; Jamesi.17. The 
same sense is found in Gen. xxx. 20, 
Prov. iv. 2, Isa, lxii. 3; and O:GES: 
5177 (iii. A.D.) with reference to the gift 
by Marcus Aurelius of a new law-court, 
ὁπότε ἐδω[ρ]ήσατο τῆι πατρίδι ἡμῶν 
[τ]ὴν ἀγορὰν τῶν δικῶν. τοῦ καλέσ- 
αντος ἡμᾶς. Judging from usage else- 
where in N.T., the reference would 
here be to God, who is always the 
Caller. 2 Peter, however, shows great 
independence of thought in other direc- 
tions, and it is more likely that the 
reference is to Christ, especially as ἐπί- 
yvwots is used consistently in relation to 
Christ (i. 8, ii. 20). (So Spitta, Von 
Soden, Mayor). ‘ Cognitionem dei prae-- 
supponit haec epistula, ver. 3. Cogni- 
tionem autem Domini nostri, nempe Jesu 
pat urget proprie”’ _(Bengel). Cf. 

Clem. ix. 5. χριστὸς «νὸν ἐγένετο 
ὟΝ καὶ οὕτως ἡμᾶς ἐκάλεσεν. ἰδίᾳ 
δόξῃ καὶ ἀρετῇ. Has ἰδίᾳ an intensive 
force here, or has it an exhausted sense 


3-4 


IIETPOY B 


125 


γνώσεως τοῦ καλέσαντος ἡμᾶς ἰδίᾳ δόξῃ καὶ ἀρετῇ} 4. δι ὧν τὰ 


τίμια ἡμῖν καὶ μέγιστα 2 ἐπαγγέλματα δεδώρηται, ἵνα διὰ τούτων 


ένησθε θείας κοινωνοὶ φύσεως, ἀποφυγόντες τῆς ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ ἐν 
3 Ἵ t 


1 δια δοξης και αρετης BKL, 31, WH. 


Recurrence of δια in vv. 3, 4 would lead 


to dittography, and correction to genitive easily follows. The versions are unani- 


mous in favour of the reading adopted. 


2 rusia και μεγιστα nui B, syrP, spec., WH, Mayor; μεγιστα kat τιμια ἡμῖν 


ACP, syrp (A, syrP υμιν), 13, 31 + Treg. 


merely equivalent to a personal pronoun ? 
The emphasis conveyed in the former 
interpretation would better carry on the 
sense of πάντα. δόξα is used in sense of 
John i. 14. ἀρετή is an interesting word. 
There is considerable evidence to prove 
that it is not used here in the ordinary 
Greek philosophical sense of ‘ virtue,” 
although the combination of δόξα 
and ἀρετή is not infrequently found 
in philosophical writings (cf. Plat. Symp. 
208 ἢ. Plut. Mor.535). Deissmann, fol- 
lowing the Stratonicean inscription al- 
ready mentioned, renders “ manifestation 
of power,” i.e., in miracle (op. cit. pp. 
95-97). In 1 Pet. ii. g it is used in 
plural, in LXX_ sense = “praises” 
(aon). (Cf. Thuc. i. 33.) In P. 
Hib. xv. “3 ff. (ili. B.c.) the younger men 
are exhorted to employ their bodies 
εὐκαίρως τὴν ἀπόδειξιν ποιησαμένους 
“τῆς αὐτῶν ἀρετῆς, “in a timely display 
of their prowess” (G. and H.). In later 
papyri ἀρετή is used as title of courtesy, 
.g., P. Oxy. 71, ii. 18 (iv. A.D.). εἴ σου 
δόξειεν τῇ ἀρετῇ =“ if it please your 
Excellency’’. Foucart defines ἀρετή as 
‘vim divinam quae mirabilem in modum 
hominibus laborantibus salutem afferret ”’ 
(cf. Hort’s note, τ Peter, p. 129 and 
MME, Sept. 1908). 

The phrase τοῦ καλέσαντος... . . ἀρετῇ 
contains one of the finest ideas in the 
N.T. What could be a more effective 
answer to the intellectualism of the 
Gnostic teachers or its modern equiva- 
lent, than the impression produced on 
the lives of men, and especially the early 
disciples, by the Personality of Jesus? 
They beheld His glory in the evidences of 
miraculous knowledge and power which 
_Jesus showed at the time of their call (John 
1. 42, 47-51; Luke v. 4). Their sense of 
His moral greatness overcame all resist- 
ance on their part (Luke v. 8; John i. 40). 
If 2 Pet. is lacking in devotional expres- 
sion, his apologetic for the person of 
Christ is cast on most effective lines. 
Reason can only compass the facts of 
Revelation, in terms ofantinomies, and it 
is vain to meet inadequate theories of the 


person of Christ by dogmatic subtlety. 
The Life and Death of our Lord, if its sig- 
nificance is to be fully understood, must 
be looked upon largely as an acted 
parable, and Christian experience—the 
impression of δόξα καὶ apery—is an 
indispensable constituent of dogmatic 
expression. 

Ver. 4. δι᾽ dv. Reference is to δόξῃ 
καὶ ἀρετῇ (so Kiihl, Dietlein, Wiesinger, 
Briickner, Mayor) émayyéApata= “ pro- 
mised blessings’. No doubt what 2 
Peter has chiefly in view is the particular 
comprehensive ἐπάγγελμα of His Second 
Coming (cf. iii. 4, ἐπαγγελία and 111. 13). 
The Parousia will be the vindication of 
all moral and spiritual effort. Christ 
promised forgiveness to the sinful, rest 
to the weary, comfort to the sad, hope to 
the dying and life to the dead. If the 
reference adopted above of δι᾽ ὧν is 
correct, the sense would be that in the 
character and deeds of the Incarnate 
One, we have a revelation that is itself 
a promise. The ἐπαγγέλματα are given, 
not only in word but also in deed. The 
very life of Christ among men, with its 
δόξα and ἀρετή is itself the Promise of 
Life, and the Parousia expectation is also 
a faith that He lives and reigns in grace, 
having “received gifts formen”’. δεδώ- 
pytat. Passive, see note on ver. 3. ἵνα διὰ 
τούτων. .. φύσεως. τούτων refers to 
ἐπαγγέλματα. The hope and faith kin- 
dled in us by the promises are a source of 
moral power. “ Thehistory of the material 
progress of the race is the history of the 
growing power of man, arising from the 
gradual extension of his alliances with the 
forces which surroundhim.. . . Hearms 
himself with the strength of the winds and 
the tides. He liberates the latent energy 
which has been condensed and treasured 
up in coal, transforms it into heat, 
generates steam, and sweeps across a 
continent without weariness, and with 
the swiftness of a bird. . . . Moving 
freely among the stupendous energies by 
which he is encompassed, he is strong in 
their strength, and they give to his voli- 
tions—powerless apart from them—a 
large and effective expression. The his- 


126 


b Gen. 


> Vd b A 
ἐπιθυμίᾳ "ἢ φθορᾶς. 
after pte $ ahs 


TIETPOY B I. 


Ν A 
5. Kal αὐτὸ “ τοῦτο δὲ σπουδὴν πᾶσαν παρει- 


ἀποφυγ. σενέγκαντες ἐπιχορηγήσατε ἐν τῇ πίστει ὑμῶν τὴν ἀρετήν, ἐν δὲ τῇ 


found 


hereonly. ἀρετῇ τὴν γνῶσιν, 6. ἐν δὲ TH γνώσει τὴν ἐγκράτειαν, ἐν δὲ TH 


ς Xen. 

Anab.1, 

9, 21, Plat- Protag. 310e. 
tory of man’s triumphs in the province of 
his higher and spiritual life is also the 
history of the gradual extension of his 
alliance with a Force which is not his 
own... .In Christ we are ‘ made par- 
takers of the divine nature’’’ (Dale, 
Atonement, pp. 416, 417). θεία φύσις is 
originally a philosophic term, cf. Plat. 
Symp. i. 6, Philo (ed. Mangey), ii. pp. 51, 
647; ii. 22, 143, 320, 343.  Qetos is 
found in a papyrus of 232 A.D. = “ im- 
perial’’ (Deissmann, of. cit. p. 218, note 
2). Probably 2 Peter is here again making 
use of a current religious expression (cf. 
note on θεία δύναμις, ver. 3). ἀποφυγόν- 
Tas... φθορᾶς. The aorist participle 
is used of coincident action. Moral eman- 
cipation is part of the κοινωνία θείας 
φύσεως. The idea of participation in the 
Divine Nature is set between the two pic- 
tures, one of hope, Ta τίμια ἡμῖν Kal pe- 
γιστα ἐπαγγέλματα, the other of despair, 
τῆς ἐν TO κόσμῳ ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ φθορᾶς. 
The way to God is through the Redemp- 
tion of Christ. The approach to God is 
an “escape,” and not an act of intellectual 
effort. φθορά in philosophic writers is 
the counterpart of γένεσις, cf. Plat. Rep. 
5464, Phaed. 95Ε. Aristot. Phys. 5, 5, 6. 
It expresses not sudden but gradual dis- 
solution and destruction. ‘The scriptural 
meaning alternates between destruction 
in the moral, and in the physical sense. 
In the N.T. the significance is physical, 
in 1 Cor. xv. 42, 50, Col. ii. 22, Gal. vi. 
8, ii. Pet. ii. 12; moral here, as in 2 Pet. 
ii. 19, Rom. viii. 21. Man becomes either 
regenerate or degenerate. Either his 
spiritual and moral powers are subject 
to slow decay and death, the wages of 
sin (ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ), or he rises to full par- 
ticipation in the Divine. ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ, a 
compact phrase. The corruption con- 
sists in ἐπιθυμία, which may be inter- 
preted in the widest sense of inordinate 
affection for earthly things. ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ; 
cf. Rom. viii. 21. φθορά becomes personi- 
fied as a world-wide power to which 
all creation including man is subject. In 
Mayor’s edition there is a valuable study 
of φθορά and cognates (pp. 175 ff.). The 
idea contained in φθορά, moral decay, 
is illustrated in Tennyson’s “ Palace of 
Art,” and “‘ Vision of Sin”; also in Byron, 
e.g., “ Stanzas for Music”’. 

Vv. 5-7. Faith is not only illumination 


but character. ‘Nor is this all. On 
your part bring the utmost earnestness 
to bear, and in your faith supply moral 
energy, and in your moral energy under- 
standing, and in your understanding self- 
control, and in your self-control patient 
endurance, and in patient endurance 
piety, and in piety brotherly love, and in 
brotherly love love.”’ 

Ver. 5. καὶ αὐτὸ τοῦτο δὲ, a phrase 
that emphasises the fact of the δώρημα 
as having its logical outcome in character. 
“The soul of religion is the practick 
part’? (Bunyan). On the other hand, 2 
Peter here teaches that so-called practical 
Christianity without the spiritual motive is 
incomplete and unintelligent. σπουδὴν 
πᾶσαν παρεισενέγκαντες, an impressive 
phrase. Cf.similar ideas in Rom. xii. 11, 
Heb. vi. 11. It is a warning against 
sluggishness and self-indulgence in the 
spiritual life. ἐπιχορηγήσατε. The A.V. 
trans., “ add to,” is insufficient. χορηγός 
in Attic drama is one who defrays the 
cost of the chorus, at the bidding of the 
State, as an act of citizenship (Dem. 
496, 26). It was a duty that prompted 
to lavishness in execution. Hence χορη- 
γέω came to mean “supplying costs for 
any purpose,”’ a public duty or λειτουργία, 
with a tendency, as here, towards the 
meaning, “ providing more than is barely 
demanded”. In P. Oxy. 2825 ff. (30-35 
A.D.), a man complains that his wife had 
deserted him, although ἐπεχορήγησα 
αὐτῇ τὰ ἑξῆς καὶ ὑπὲρ δύναμιν (“1 pro- 
vided for her suitably and beyond my 
resources’’). ἐπι- denotes a particular ap- 
plication of χορηγέω (c/. Moulton, Proleg. 
p- 113). ἐν ‘fis used each time of that 
which is supposed to be theirs” (Alford). 
ἀρετή: “strenuus animae tonus ac 
vigor” (Bengel)—a manifestation of 
moral power. γνῶσιν, understanding, 
implying insight, circumspection, discre- 
tion, discernment (cf. 1 Cor. xvi. 18). 
Cf. Didache, ix. 3 (in Eucharistic prayer), 
xi. 2, where -yv. is conjoined with δικαιο- 
σύνη. 

Ver. 6. ἐγκράτειαν : “self-control” : 
accompanied by, and arising from, know- 
ledge, and not a mere product of fear 
or submission to authority. ὑπομονήν: 
‘* steadfastness ’—not turned aside from 
the faith by trial and suffering (cf; Luke 
viii. 15, Rom. v. 3 ff.). The desponding 


5—9- 


IIETPOY B 


127 


ἐγκρατείᾳ τὴν ὑπομονήν, ἐν δὲ τῇ ὑπομονῇ τὴν εὐσέβειαν, 7. ἐν δὲ 
τῇ εὐσεβείᾳ τὴν φιλαδελφίαν, ἐν δὲ τῇ φιλαδελφίᾳ τὴν ἀγάπην. 8. 


ταῦτα γὰρ ὑμῖν ὑπάρχοντα καὶ πλεονάζοντα οὐκ ἀργοὺς οὐδὲ ἀκάρ- 


mous καθίστησιν εἰς τὴν τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ ἐπίγνωσιν. 
9. ᾧ yap “ph πάρεστιν ταῦτα, τυφλός ἐστιν μυωπάζων, λήθην λαβὼν 


doctrine of the false teachers would itself 
call for ὑπομονή in the readers. Mayor 
compares the Aristotelian καρτερία (cf. 
Heb. xi. 27). εὐσέβειαν. In the Epistle 
the false teachers are ἀσεβεῖς (cf. note 
on v. 3). 

Ver. 7. φιλαδελφίαν: “affection to- 
wards the brethren,” i.¢., of the same 
Christian community. ἀγάπην : prob- 
ably love towards all, even enemies; not 
directed by sense and emotion, but by 
deliberate choice (cf. Matt. v. 44). Mayor 
interprets: “ Love to God manifesting 
itself in love to man and to the whole 
creation, animate and inanimate”. 

Vv. 8-11. Further emphasis on the 
connexion between faith and morality, 
and its reward. ‘If you have these vir- 
tues, and are not sparing in your use of 
them, you will not be ineffective and un- 
fruitful in the direction of deepening 
your Christian experience. Where these 
virtues are not present a man is blind, 
near-sighted as it were, and entirely for- 
getful of the great fact that he is purified 
from the sins of the past. With this 
danger in view, your earnest purpose 
ought to be to make sure your calling 
and election. Steadily practise these 
virtues and you will not stumble; for 
thus there will be ministered unto you 
an abundant entrance into the eternal 
kingdom.” 

Ver. 8. πλεονάζοντα: “abound”, In 
classical use=“ exaggerate”. The word 
here again emphasises the display of a 
regal, uncalculating and unwearied spirit 
in the practice of the Christian graces. 
ἀργοὺς. Perhaps “ ineffective” or “in- 
effectual,’”” a meaning which is further 
emphasised in ἀκάρπους. In The Di- 
dache, 12, are given directions for dis- 
criminating genuine from false among 
the itinerant teachers. ‘If he wishes 
to settle with you and is a tradesman, 
let him work and let him eat. If he 
has no trade, according to your wisdom 
provide how he shall live as a Chris- 
tian among you, but not in idleness 
(μὴ ἀργός). If he will not do this, he is 
making merchandise of Christ. Beware 
of such men.” Here is illustrated the 
passage from the ordinary sense of ἀργός, 
which really signifies ‘‘ idle” for want of 
occupation, and not by choice, to the 


d Acts xv. 
29 (D), 1 
John iv. 
3, Tit.its. 

ethical significance. Cf. James ii. 20, 

“ Faith without works is apyy’’. Matt. 

xx. 6, “ Why stand ye here all the day, 

a&pyot?’’ and the reply. Cf. also use of 

ἀργεῖ in ii. 3. In P. Par. II. 4(9)* (iii. 

B.C.), certain quarrymen complain that 

they “are idle (4pyotpev) for want of 

slaves to clear away the sand”. Cf. 

P. Par. 11. 20. ὅπως... μὴ ἄργῆι τὰ 

πλοῖα. Ρ. Lond. 2οδ810 (ii. a.D.). λόγος 

ἐργατῶν ἀργησάντων. In P. Lond. 1Π|. 

p- 27 (acensus-return of 160 or 161 A.D.) ἃ 

certain Apollonius is described as belong- 

ing to ‘‘ the leisured class of Memphis’’. 

(τῶν ἀπὸ Μέμφεως ἀργῶν). P. Fior. 1. 

P. Amh, 97? (both ii.a.p.) ἐλαιουργίου 

ἀργοῦ = “an oil-press which is out of 

working order” εἰς τὴν. . . ἐπίγνωσιν. 

Here the writer returns to the idea, in- 

troduced by ἀποφυγόντες . . . φθορᾶς 

in v. 4, that morality and religion are 
intimately connected. Some have sought 
to interpret the words as meaning “ with 
reference to the knowledge of our Lord 
Jesus Christ,’ on the ground that ἐπί- 
yvwots has already been postulated as 
the source of “all things needed for lite 
and godliness,’ and cannot now be re- 
garded as an end to be attained. Yet 
ἐπίγνωσις inay be regarded as both the 

beginning and the end of morality (cf. iii. 

18, Col. i. 6 ff. Phil. i. 9). The transla- 

tion of A.V. is correct (eis =in, expressive 

of result). ἐπίγν. contrasted with γνῶσις 
marks “ἃ higher degree of intensity, an 
energy of deeper penetration. It is nota 
quiescent state, the resting in an acquire- 
ment, but the advance of one to whom 
easy attainment is but the impulse of 
fresh effort; one who is not content to 

know, but ever, in Hosea’s words (vi. 3), 

follows on to know” (Paget, Spirit of 

Discipline, p. 112). Each advance in the 

Christian life deepens and widens our 

spiritual understanding. ‘ Die ἐπίγν. ist 

ihrer Natur nach etwas, was wachst”’ 

(Von Soden). 

Ver. 9. μνωπάζων : “short-sighted”. 
Only once elsewhere in Greek literature 
in Ps. Dionys. Eccl. Hier. ii. 3. This 
is one of the words to which exception 
has been taken in 2 Peter. It is both 
rare, and it seems to contradict τυφλός. 
Spitta and Von S. translate “ wilfully 
blind”. Mayor (p. lxi.) (fo lowing Beza 


128 


e Heb. i. 3. 


τοῦ καθαρισμοῦ τῶν πάλαι αὐτοῦ " ἁμαρτιῶν. 


TIETPOY B. Ι 


TO. διὸ μᾶλλον, 


ἀδελφοί, σπουδάσατε βεβαίαν ὑμῶν τὴν κλῆσιν καὶ ἐκλογὴν 


f Moulton, 
Proleg. 
pp. 188 ff. 


g Matt. 
Xxiv. 6 
only. 


1 μελλησω SSABCP, vg., Ti., Treg., WH; οὐκ αμελησω KL, syrr. 


ποιεῖσθαι " ταῦτα yap ποιοῦντες οὐ * μὴ πταίσητέ ποτε" 11. οὕτως 
γὰρ πλουσίως ἐπιχορηγηθήσεται ὑμῖν ἡ εἴσοδος εἰς τὴν αἰώνιον 
βασιλείαν τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν καὶ σωτῆρος ᾿ἸΙησοῦ Χριστοῦ. 

12. Διὸ ἐμελλήσωϊ ἀεὶ ὑμᾶς ὑπομιμνήσκειν περὶ τούτων, 


The analogy 


of σπουδασω in ver. 15 favours reading adopted. Yet, in MSS., there is frequent con- 
fusion between μελλω and pedo, ¢.g., John xii. 6, 1 Peter v. 7, Matt. xxii. 16, where 


μέλλω is incorrect. 


Field (Notes on Trans. of N.T. p. 240) suggests that true 


reading here is peAnow (cf. on σπουδαΐζω ver. 15). 


Grotius, Huther, etc.) interprets the word 
as limiting τυφλός. ‘ He who is with- 
out the virtues mentioned in i. 5-7 is 
blind, or to put it more exactly is short- 
sighted ; he cannot see the things of 
heaven, though he may be quick enough 
in regard to worldly matters.” λήθην 
λαβὼν. A periphrastic form. Cf. Jos. Ant. 
ii. 6,9; also 2 Tim. i. 5, Heb. xi. 29. τοῦ 
καθαρισμοῦ τῶν πάλαι αὐτοῦ ἁμαρτιῶν. 
Is the reference to baptism? This view 
is rendered very probable by the use of 
πάλαι. For the idea of cleansing from 
pre-baptismal sin, cf. Barnabas, xi. 11, 
Hermas, Mand. iv, 3. Vis. ii. 1. Spitta 
adheres to the general interpretation of 
καθ. as the work of Christ on the moral 
life. Cf. ii. 20-22, 1 Jn. iii. 3. While 
καθαρισμός is used of the ceremonial 
washings of the Jews, John ili. 25, it is 
also used of the work of Christ in Heb. 
i. 3 (cf. Zahn. Introd. ii. 232). 

Ver. 10. σπουδάσατε. An Imperative. 
‘A sharp and urgent form’ (Moulton, 
Proleg. i. 173). BeBaiav. Cf. Deiss- 
mann, B. S. pp. 105 ff. The word has a 
legal sense. BeBatwous is the legal guar- 
antee, obtained by a buyer from a seller, 
to be gone back upon should any third 
party claim the thing. Here the readers 
are exhorted to produce a guarantee of 
their calling and election. This may be 
done by the cultivation of the Christian 
graces, Cf. Eph. iv. 1. “Τὸ walk worthily 
of the calling wherewith ye are called.” 
κλῆσιν Kat ἐκλογὴν. What is the differ- 
ence between these two? καλέω used 
in Gospels = ‘‘ bid toa feast’”’. κλητοί 
would, therefore, imply those bidden; 
ἐκλεκτοί = those who have become true 
partakers of God’s salvation. Cf. Matt. 
xxii. 14. Not all who hear the Divine 
Voice (κλῆσιν) progress in Christian con- 
duct, which is the token of ἐκλογήν. 
ov μὴ πταίσητε, as a blind or short- 
sighted person might do. 

Ver. 11. Note the accumulation in 
this verse of words suggesting splendour 


and fulness. ἐπιχορηγηθήσεται. Cf. 
note on v. 5. Mayor says that here the 
word ‘‘ suggests the ordering of a trium- 
phal procession,” and compares Plut. Vit. 
994, ὁ δῆμος ἐθεᾶτο τὰς θέας ἀφειδῶς 
πάνυ χορηγουμένας. εἴσοδος. Cf. Heb. 
x. 19. Ina theatre, εἰσ. is the place of 
entrance for the chorus (Ar. Nub. 326; 
Av. 296), and in P. Par. ii. 41, we find 
εἴσοδος Kowy=of the door of a house. 
The great description of the entrance of 
the pilgrims into the celestial city in 
Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, Pt. i., may 
be quoted in illustration. αἰώνιον βασιλ- 
είαν. does not occur elsewhere in N.T. 
or Apostolic Fathers (cf. Aristotle’s Apol. 
xvi., and Clem. Hom. x. 25), but αἰωνίου 
ἀρχῆς occurs in the Stratonicean inscrip- 
tions already quoted (Deissmann, of. cit. 
p. 361). 

Vv. 12-15. The aim of the writer, and 
the urgency of his message. ‘‘ You are 
already acquainted with and established 
in the truth, so far as revealed to you, 
but, in view of the great issues, I shall 
always be prepared to awaken you toa 
sense of these things. In my lifetime I 
feel bound to do so, especially as I know 
that death is imminent, as Jesus declared 
tome. I shall also do my best to enable 
you to refer to these things as oppor- 
tunity occurs, even after my decease.” 

Ver. 12. μελλήσω. What is the exact 
significance of the future? Itcan hardly 
be simply a periphrastic future. ‘* The 
idea is rather that the writer will be 
prepared in the future, as well as in the 
past and in the present to remind them 
of the truths they know, whenever the 
necessity arises” (Zahn. Introd., ii., p. 
211; quoted with approval by Nestle. 
Text. Criticism of N.T. pp. 333-34). 
ἐστηριγμένους. This word is used by 
Jesus in the warning given of Peter’s 
fall, and its spiritual result. καὶ ov ποτε 
ἐπιστρέψας στήρισον τοὺς ἀδελφούς 
σου (Lk. xxii. 32). Cf. τ Pet. v. 10, 2 
Pet. iii. 17, where στηριγμός = “ stead- 


1o—I5. ILETPOY B 129 
h , 3 sige J a ΄ oq ses 
καΐπερ εἰδότας Kal ἐστηριγμένους ἐ ; ΙΕ ΤΣ tite 
' ρ me 5 , ill yp us bi TH παρούσῃ ἀληθείᾳ. 13. Phe 
δίκαιον δὲ ἡγοῦμαι, ἐφ᾽ ὅσον εἰμὶ ἐν τούτῳ τῷ σκηνώματι, διε- ΤΈΣ 
γειρειν ὑμᾶς ἐν ὑπομνήσει, 14. εἰδὼς ὅτι ταχινή ἐστιν ἡ ἀπόθεσις i For aa 
τ as ἐν 5 ruc 10n 
τοῦ σκηνώματός μου, καθὼς καὶ ὁ κύριος ἡρῶν ᾿Ιησοῦς Χριστὸς eat 
wi 
ἐδήλωσέν por. 15. σπουδάσω 1 δὲ καὶ ἑκάστοτε ‘éxew ὑμᾶς μετὰ infin. see 
att. 
Xvili. 25, 
Eph. iv. 28 


lomovdalw SQ 31, arm., syrP, “an intentional alteration. .. copyists and trans- 
lators could not bring themselves to read here again a promise of Peter’s, which he 


seemed not to have fulfilled” (Zahn, Introd. ii. p. 212). 


to variants for peAAnow (ver. 12) (ibid. cf. 


fastness of mind”. ἐν τῇ παρούσῃ 
ἀληθείᾳ..--- “in the present truth,” i.e. 
in so far as you yet have experience of 
it. Cf. note on v. 8. 

Ver. 13. δίκαιον δὲ ἡγοῦμαι. “1 
consider it a duty.” The language in 
vv. 13, 14, is studiously solemn and im- 
pressive. σκηνώματι, used in literal 
sense of “tent” in Deut. xxxiii. 18. In 
Acts vii. 46, it is used of the Tabernacle 
of God. Elsewhere in N.T. σκῆνος is 
used in the metaphorical sense of human 
existence. Cf. 2 Cor. v. 4. A similar 
use of σκήνωμα is found in Ep. ad 
Diogn. 6. ἀθάνατος ἣ ψυχὴ ἐν θνητῷ 
σκηνώματι κατοικεῖ. σκηνή is the word 
used by Peter in the transfiguration story 
(Matt. xvii. 4; Mark ix. 5; Luke ix. 33). 
διεγείρειν ὑμᾶς ἐν ὑπομνήσει: Srey. 
is always used in N.T. = “awaken” or 
“rouse from sleep” (except in Jn. vi. 18 
of the sea); significant in view of the 
reference to the Transfiguration in vv. 
16 ff. Cf. διαγρηγορήσαντες (‘fully 
awake”’) in St. Luke’s account; Introd. 

- 95. 
᾿ Ver. 14. ταχινή “imminent,” cf. ii. τ. 
A poetical word peculiar to 2 Peter in 
N.T. The process described by ἀπόθεσις 
can hardly be ‘sudden,’ Plat. Rep. 
553D, but there is always an impression 
of suddenness to the onlooker, who lifts 
up his eyes some morning, and finds 
the tent or the encampment gone where 
he had seen it yesterday. An inscrip- 
tion in C.I.A. III. 13443, reads ζωῆς 
καὶ καμάτου τέρμα δραμὼν ταχινόν, 
where sense can only be “ὑγιεῖ (but 
see discussion in Zahn. Introd., ii., pp. 212 
f.). ἀπόθεσιν τοῦ σκην. ἀποτίθεμαι is 
used οἵ “ putting off a garment” (Acts 
vii. 58); and might here be connected 
with the idea of taking off a tent-cover 
(So Spitta). Probably “removal” is the 
proper translation. In B.G.U. 606° (iv. 
A.D.) [πρὸς ἀπόθεσιν ἀχύρου (for re- 
moval of a chaff-heap) is found. Cf. 1 
Pet. iii. 21, οὐ σαρκὸς ἀπόθεσις ῥύπου. 


These remarks apply also 
Nestle, Textual Criticism of N.T. p. 324). 


καθὼς Kal... ἐδήλωσέν por. There 
seems no reason to doubt the reference 
here to John xxi. 18, 19, as Spitta and 
others have done (see Introduction, pp. 
96 f.). 

Ve. I5. omovdsadow. The form is 
used by Polybius and later writers for 
the classical σπουδάσομαι. ἑκάστοτε 
goes with ἔχειν = “on each occasion 
when you have need”. The word is 
found apparently in the same sense in 
P. Gen. 318. (ii. A.D.), ἑκάστοτέ σοι 
κατ᾽ ἐπιδημίαν παρενοχλῶν (‘causing 
you annoyance on each occasion when 
you are at home’’). τὴν τούτων μνήμην 
ποιεῖσθαι. What is the reference in 
τούτων ἢ It must have the same refer- 
ence as in verse 12, vz. to the practice 
of the Christian graces, and the larger 
reference must be to some systematic 
body of instruction. This might easily 
take the form of reminiscences of the 
example of Jesus Himself, and the allu- 
sion may be to the Petrine reminiscences 
contained in the Gospel of St. Mark 
(cf. μετὰ δὲ τὴν τούτων (Peter and Paul) 
ἔξοδον Μᾶρκος τὰ ὑπὸ Πέτρου κηρυσ- 
σόμενα ἐγγράφως ἡμῖν παραδέδωκεν 
Iren. iii. 1.1.). ‘‘ He has already referred 
to Christ (v. 3), as having called them ἰδίᾳ 
δόξῃ καὶ aperq”’ ; surely nothing could be 
more appropriate, more helpful to a godly 
life, than that Peter should leave behind 
the picture of this δόξα καὶ ἀρετή drawn 
from his own recollection. And the 
following words, οὐ yap σεσοφισμένος 
k.t.A. (v. 16) seem to imply a statement 
of facts ” (Mayor, cxlill., where see whole 
discussion against Zahn. Introd. 11. pp. 
199 ff.). ἔξοδον. The same word is used 
in Luke ix. 31 of the death of Christ. It 
seems to include the thought of subse- 
quent glory (cf. Expositor, vi. ii. pp. 
73 f. Smith, Days of His Flesh, pp. 
274 f.) The meaning “ death” is found 
ετπι- 
γνοῦσα τὴν (τοὴῦ Εὐδαίμονος ἔξοδον. 

τὴν τούτων μνήμην ποιεῖσθαι : “τεῖοτ 


130 


τὴν ἐμὴν ἔξοδον τὴν τούτων μνήμην ποιεῖσθαι. 


ΠΕΤΡΟῪ Β 4 


16. 


οὐ yap 


k Amos ii, σεσοφισμένοις μύθοις * ἐξακολουθήσαντες ἐγνωρίσαμεν ὑμῖν τὴν τοῦ 


4, Isa. lvi. 
II, ο΄. 2 
Peter ii. 
2, 15. 


, cee 3 A A , ‘ , 3 5, αἱ 
κυρίου ἡμῶν ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ δύναμιν καὶ παρουσίαν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐπόπται 
γενηθέντες τῆς ἐκείνου μεγαλειότητος. 


17. λαβὼν γὰρ παρὰ 


Θεοῦ πατρὸς τιμὴν καὶ δόξαν, φωνῆς ἐνεχθείσης αὐτῷ τοιᾶσδε 
Pp μη μ χϑειση δ 


to”; always in Greek writers, from Hero- 
dotus down = “mentionem facere, 
‘«make mention of” (cf. Grimm-Thayer 
under μνήμη). The sense here seems 
much the same. The document “ referred 
to” would be an authentic source of in- 
formation. Cf. P. Fay, 19° (ii. a.D.) 
[ἀκριβ]εστάτην μνήμην ποιούμενος. 
Vv. 16-18. The fact of the Trans- 
figuration a guarantee of the writer’s 
truthfulness. ‘‘ For we are not without 
facts to rest upon. Our preaching of 
the power and coming of Jesus Christ 
was not based on sophistical myths. 
We were eye-witnesses of His Majesty. 
For He received from God the Father 
honour and glory, a voice coming to 
Him through the splendour of the glory, 
‘ This is my beloved Son in whom I am 
well pleased’. This voice we heard, as 
it was borne from heaven, when we were 
with Him in the Holy Mount.” (Fora 
comparison of this passage, with the 


Synoptic account, see Introduction, 
pp- 94 ff.). : 
er. 16. σεσοφισμ. μύθ. Cf. σεσο- 


φισμένη μήτηρ.: “᾿ suppositious mother ’’. 
Greg. Nyss.i.171 D. Thisis evidently the 
character attributed to the facts of the 
Christian Gospel by the False Teachers. 
They specially sought to discredit the 
outlook for the Second Advent. μῦθοι 
is often used in the Pastoral Epistles οἱ 
the fanciful Gnostic genealogies (τ Tim. 
i. 4, iv. 7; Tit. i. 14). ἐγνωρίσαμεν. 
Used in N.T. of preaching the Gospel 
(e.g. τ Cor. xv. 1). δύναμιν καὶ παρ- 
ουσίαν. For collocation of words, cf. 
Matt. xxiv. 30, Mark ix. τ. For δύναμις, 
see note on verse 3. παρουσίαν. Chase 
(op. cit. 797a) regards the word here as 
denoting the first coming of Christ, be- 
cause (1) the context speaks of history 
and not of prophecy; (2) the word itself 
naturally bears this meaning. He 
admits, however, that elsewhere in the 
N.T and in this Epistle it is used of the 
Second Coming (cf. Ignat. Philad. 9). 
Justin (Dialogue 32) distinguishes “ two 
advents,—one in which He was pierced 
by you; a second, when you shall know 
Him, Whom you have pierced”. There 
is, however, no real difficulty here in 
taking wap. in the usual sense, which, 


indeed, is more in harmony with the 
context. The Transfiguration itself, as 
used by this writer, is regarded as a 
basis for belief in the Second Advent, 
against the False Teachers. 

Dr. Milligan, in his recent edition of 
Thessalonians, gives a valuable note on 
παρουσία (p. 145). He mentions that it 
occurs frequently in the Papyri as a 
kind of terminus technicus with reference 
to the visit of the king, or some other 
official. (P. Petr. ii. 39 (e), 18 (iii. ἘΠΕῚ 
P, 'Tebt. 48, 13 f. (i. B.c.), 116 (ii ἘΠῚ 
P. Gren., ii. 14 (δ), 2 (iii. B.c.)). Ditten- 
berger, Sylloge, 226, 84 ff. (iii. Bc.) τῶν 
δὲ ἀρχόντων συναγαγόντων ἐκλησίαν 
καὶ τήντε παρουσίαν ἐμφανισάντωντοῦ 
βασιλέως. ‘ We fall back upon”? these 
examples of the word “the more gladly 
because for this particular sense of the 
word the Jewish sacred writings give us 
little help ” (¢bid.). The word must, there- 
fore, have come into use, in this applica- 
tion to the Second Advent, in apostolic 
times, as faithfully representing the 
meaning of Jesus Himself (cf. Matt. xxiv. 
3, 27, 37,39). The usual classical sense 
of the word as “presence”’ must not be 
disregarded. Taken together with the other 
meaning illustrated by the Κοινή, παρου- 
σία would thus seem to combine in itself 
the meaning of “actual presence,’’ and a 
near “coming”. This combination of 
meaning in the consciousness of the 
early Church, with its perplexity as to 
the interpretation of our Lord’s promise, 
would seem to be reflected in John xvi. 
16-18. ἐπόπται : used of those who had 
attained the highest degree of initiation 
into the Eleusinian mysteries. Judging 
from the use of ἐποπτεύω in τ Peter, the 
word may have passed into ordinary 
speech, but no doubt is used here to en- 
hance the splendour of the vision, and the 
honour done the disciples, at the Trans- 
figuration—“ admitted to the spectacle of 
His grandeur’ (Moffat, H. N. T. p. 600). 
ἐπόπτης is applied to God in Esth. v. 1, 
2 Mace. vii. 35, cf. O.G.1.S., 666% τὸν 
Ἥλιον “Adpaxiv ἐπόπτην καὶ σωτῆρᾳ 
(reference to an Egyptian Sun-god). Hof- 
mann holds that the reference is rather to 
the Resurrection and Ascension. μεγαλε- 
totntos. Cf. Luke ix. 43, Acts xix. 27. 


16—1I9Q. TIETPOY B 131 
ὑπὸ τῆς μεγαλοπρεποῦς δόξης Ὁ υἱός pou 6 ἀγαπητός pou οὗτός 1 reg 
ἐστιν, εἰς ὃν ἐγὼ ᾿ εὐδόκησα,---τ8. καὶ ταύτην τὴν φωνὴν ἡμεῖς Mark i. τ 
ἠκούσαμεν ἐξ οὐρανοῦ ™ ἐνεχθεῖσαν σὺν αὐτῷ ὄντες ἐν τῷ ἁγίῳ iii. 22. 
ὄρει - 19. καὶ ἔχομεν βεβαιότερον τὸν προφητικὸν λόγον, ᾧ καλῶς WAS ra 
ποιεῖτε " προσέχοντες ὡς λύχνῳ φαίνοντι ἐν αὐχμηρῷ τόπῳ, ° ἕως οὗ πο va, 
ἡμέρα διαυγάσῃ καὶ φωσφόρος ἀνατείλῃ ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις ὑμῶν᾽ ned 
n 3 Johnvi., 
Acts x. 33, 


Phil. iv. 14. ο Mark xiv. 32 Luke xiii. 8. 


lao τῆς peyador. SyITe 


Ver. 17. λαβὼν. It is well-nigh im- 
possible to say what is the case agreement 
of the participle here. It is at least cer- 
tain that the subject is Jesus. Dietlein, 
Schott, Ewald, and Mayor agree that 
the writer intended to go on, ἐβεβαίωσεν 
τὸν προφητικὸν λόγον, for which he 
substitutes kat ἔχομεν βεβαιότερον, after 
the parenthetic 18th verse. παρὰ Θεοῦ 
πατρός. See Hort’s note, 1 Pet. i. 2. 
The usage (without the article) indicates 
the growth of a special Christian ter- 
minology. The two words are treated as 
one proper name. τιμὴν καὶ δόξαν. A 
frequent combination, cf. Ps. viii. 6, Job. 
ΒΕ τὸ 1 Peter i. 7, Rom. ii. 7, 10, 4 Tim. 
i. 17, Heb. ii. 7,9. τιμή is the personal 
honour and esteem in which Jesus is held 
by the Father, cf. Hort’s note on 1 Pet. 
1. 7. ‘ Honour in the voice which spoke 
to Him; glory in the light which shone 
from Him” (Alford). φωνῆς . - -. τοιᾶσϑε. 
This is the only instance of τοιόσδε 
in N.T. =“to the following effect’’. 
ὑπὸ τῆς μεγαλοπρεποῦς δόξης. Re- 
taining reading ὑπὸ, we may regard 
pey. δόξα as a vehicle of expression. 
The voice expresses its significance. It 
is not a mere accompanying phenomenon 
of the voice. Cf. the instrumental dative 
in i. 21 after ἠνέχθη. pey. δόξης corres- 
ponds to “the bright cloud” (νεφέλη 
φωτεινὴ) of the Synoptics. οὐρανός is 
used in verse 18 to describe the source 
from which the voice came ; ‘the sky,” 
of. ili. 12, 13. εἰς Ov ἐγὼ εὐδόκησα. 
Moulton (Proleg. p. 63) points out that 
tendency in N.T. is for eis to encroach 
on the domain of ἐν. Cf. John i. 18,6 dv 
εἰς τὸν κόλπον (ib. p. 235). 

Ver. 18. ἐν τῷ ὄρει τῷ ἁγίῳ. The 
phrase indicates a view of the place and 
incident which has been taken up into and 
sanctified in the religious consciousness of 
the Church. The Gnostic Acts of Peter 
use the phrase “in monte sacro”’. ἅγιος 
signifies a place where Jehovah manifested 
Himself, cf. Exod. iii. 5, Isa. lii. x. 

Vv. 19-21. The Transfiguration con- 


firms Prophecy. ‘‘Thus we have still 
further confirmation of the words of the 
prophets, a fact to which you would do 
well to give heed, as to a lamp shining 
in a murky place, meant to serve until 
the Day break and the Day-Star arise in 
your hearts. Recognise, above all, this 
truth, that no prophecy is restricted to 
the particular interpretation of one 
generation. No prophecy was ever 
borne through the instrumentality of 
man’s will, but men spoke, direct from 
God, impelled by the Holy Spirit.” 

Ver. 19. βεβαιότερον. Originally alegal 
ferm., ‘See note δ. 10% ‘cf. Phili.1..7, 2 
Cor. i. 21. τὸν προφητικὸν λόγον, 7.¢. 
allin the O.T. scriptures that points to 
the Coming of the Messiah. The pro- 
phecy is now supported by its partial 
fulfilment in the Transfiguration. @ 
καλῶς ποιεῖτε προσέχοντες. “to which 
ye do well to take heed’. “καλ. 
ποιήσεις C. aor. part. is the normal way 
of saying ‘please’ in the papyri, and is 
classical’? (Moulton Proleg. p. 228). ὡς 
λύχνῳ ... Kapd. ὑμῶν. Spitta would 
eliminate the words ἕως οὗ . . . ἀνατείλῃ 
as a gloss founded on Ps. cxix. 105 
and 4 Esdras xii. 42. αὐχμηρῷ τόπῳ, 
properly=‘‘dry” or “parched’”’: then 
‘squalid’ or “rough’’. Here it means 
‘“‘murky’’. In Aristot. de Color. 3 τὸ 
αὐχμηρόν is opposed to τὸ λαμπρόν. 
φωσφόρος. ‘ Morning - star.’ Not 
found elsewhere in Biblical Greek. The 
LXX word is ἑωςφόρος. In the poets, 
the word is always applied to Venus 
(Cicero, Nat. Deorum, 2, 20). 

This verse has been much discussed. 
It may be well to mention three gram- 
matical points that emerge. (1) The 
reference of 6. It is simplest to under- 
stand it as referring to the content of the 
preceding clause, and not to τὸν mpod- 
λόγον alone, viz. the fact that the προφ. 
Aoy. is now βεβ. on account of the Trans- 
figuration. (2) ἕως οὗ κιτιλ. is to be 
taken with φαίνοντι, not with προσέχ- 
ovtTes. (3) ἐν τ. Ke ὑμῶν is connected 


132 


 Ρεΐεγ 

ii eae πον τα Say 

Tim. ii. τ᾿  ἐπιλύσεως οὐ γίνεται " 
q Heb. xii. 


METPOY B 


I, 20---21. 


20. τοῦτο " πρῶτον γινώσκοντες ὅτι πᾶσα προφητεία γραφῆς ἰδίας 
21. οὐ γὰρ θελήματι ἀνθρώπου ἠνέχθη 


τι, X.39. προφητεία ποτέ, ἀλλὰ ὑπὸ πνεύματος ἁγίου φερόμενοι ἐλάλησαν 
Art P 2 μ 


absent ἀπὸ cod! ἄνθρωποι. 
owing to 


growth of 


a special Christian terminology. Cf. Jude 8, 2 Peter ii. ro, ii. 18, i. 20. (Mayor, Ed. xxvii. ff.). 


lato Ocov BP, syrh, boh., WH, Ti.; aytot Θεου SQKL, syrp + Treg. ; ayror 


sah.; αγιοι του ©. A; αγιοι aro 6. C. 


with ἀνατείλῃ alone, and not with S:avy- 
doy. With these presuppositions we 
may briefly consider the two leading in- 
terpretations. 

I. Mayor may be taken as representa- 
tive of the view that the verse is wholly 
an exhortation to ‘search the Scrip- 
tures”. There are three stages: the 
prophetic lamp (τὸν mwpod. . . - τόπῳ͵); 
the Gospel dawn (ἡμέρα διαυγ.); the 
nner light of the spirit (φωσφόρος ... 
tpav.). “The lower degree of faith in 
the written word will be followed by 
divine insight”. He compares Euth. 
Zig. 6 προφητικὸς λόγος τοὺς ἐν ἀγνοίᾳ 
φωταγωγεῖ ἕως καθαρὸν ὑμῖν τὸ φῶς τοῦ 
εὐαγγελίου διαφανῇ καὶ 6 νοητὸς ἑωσφ- 
όρος, τουτέστι Χριστός, ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις 
ὑμῶν ἀνατείλῃ. (cf Huther, Alford). 
The objection to this view is that it 
seems to ignore the place given to the 
Transfiguration as a religious fact for 
writer and readers alike (ἔχομεν). 

2. Another and more probable view 
naturally takes ἕως ob . . . ὑμῶν as re- 
ferring to the Second Advent. This pre- 
serves the usual meaning of ἡμέρα in the 
Epistle, and it also gives point to the 
striking sequence of metaphors. The 
λύχνῳ φαίνοντι is the confirmation of 
the prophetic word by the Transfigura- 
tion which the writer has given them 
(cf. v. 16); and this is made all the more 
probable if we take the reference sug- 
gested for ᾧ in (τὴ above. The adyp. 
τόπῳ would be the world in which they 
live (cf. Ps. cxix. 105). This lamp is meant 
to serve until the glorious appearing. 
One objection to the eschatological in- 
terpretation of ἕως οὗ x.7.X. is the phrase 
ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις ὑμῶν which implies an 
inward Coming. This is largely repelled 
if we accept its grammatical connection 
with ἀνατείλῃ alone ((3) above). “The 
Morning-Star arises in their hearts, when 
the σημεῖα of the approaching Day are 
manifest to Christians. The fulfilment 
of their hope is at the door: the Lord 
is at hand”? (von Soden). See note on 
ver. 9. 







Ver. 20. τοῦτο πρῶτον γινώσκοντες. 
“ Recognising this truth above all else”’ 
(in your reading of Scripture). The 
False Teachers appealed to the O.T. 
scriptures in support of their doctrine. 
ὅτι TWaoa ... οὐ γίνεται. πᾶσα... 
οὐ need not be regarded as a Hebraism. 
It is as normal as in I Jn. ii. 21, Jn. 
iii. 16. ἰδίας ἐπιλύσεως. This passage 
is a noted crux. (1) Hardt, followed by 
Lange, Spitta and others interpret ém- 
Avo. = dissolutio. ‘No prophecy of 5. 
is of such a kind that it can be annulled”. 
But no satisfactory instance of ἔπιλυσ.- 
in this sense can be adduced. (2) Ac- 
cepting the sense of ἰδ. émA. = “ pri- 
vate,” or “human interpretation,” Von 
Soden sees a reference to the methods 
of the false teachers in their attitude 
to Scripture (cf.v. 16, ii. τὴ. ἰδίας 
‘is opposed to the φωνὴ ἐνεχθεῖσα of 
i. 17’’. (3) It seems most satisfactory to 
understand ἰδ. ἔπιλ. as the meaning of 
the prophet himself, or what was in the 
prophet’s mind when he wrote; the ful- 
filment in any particular generation or 
poch. ‘‘ The special work of the prophet 
s to interpret the working of God to his 
wn generation. But in doing this, he is 
aying down the principles of God’s action 
generally. Hence there may be many 
fulfilments of one prophecy, or to speak 
more exactly, many historical illustrations 
of some one principle of Providential Gov- 
ernment” (Mayor, p. 196). The geni- 
tive ἐπιλύσεως is gen. of definition and 
not of origin. ‘No prophecy is of such 
a nature as to be capable of a particu- 
lar interpretation.” 

Ver. 21. οὐ yap θελήματι ἀνθρώπου 
ἠνέχθη προφητεία wore. With ἠνέχθη 
cf. νν. 17, 18. ἀλλὰ ὑπὸ πνεύμ. ... 
φερόμενοι, cf. Acts ii, 2. ὥσπερ 
φερομένης πνοῆς βιαίας. Here we 
have the only reference to the Holy 
Spirit in the Epistle, and only in this 
connexion, viz. as the source of prophetic 
inspiration. The spirit is an agency 
rather than an agent. The men speak. 
The spirit impels. It is of much signific- 


1 a 


II. 1. Ἐγένοντο δὲ καὶ ψευδοπροφῆται ἐν τῷ had, 


ὑμῖν ἔσονται ψευδοδιδάσκαλοι, οἵτινες παρεισάξουσιν αἱρέσεις " ἄπω- 


Ψ 
λείας, καὶ τὸν ἀγοράσαντα αὐτοὺς Ser 
"» 


ance for the interpretation of the whole 
passage that ἄνθρωποι accupies a position 
ot emphasis at the end of the sentence, 
thus bringing into prominence the human 
agent. The prophets were not ignorant 
of the meaning of their prophecies, but 
they saw clearly only the contem- 
porary political or moral situation, and 
the principles involved and _iliustrated 
therein. 

CuHapTer II.—Vv. 1-3. The False 
Teachers and their Fudgment. ‘Yet 
there were also false prophets in the 
ancient community, just as among you 
there will be false teachers. They will not 
hesitate to introduce alongside the truth 
corrupting heresies, even denying their 
Redeemer, and bringing on themselves 
swift destruction. Many. will imitate 
their vicious example, and thereby the 
way of truth will be discredited. Nay, 
further, actuated by covetousness, they 
will make merchandise of you by lying 
words. Yet you must not think that the 
judgment passed on all such long ago is 


inactive. Their destruction is awaiting 
them.” 
Ver. I. ψευδοπροφῆται ἐν τῷ λαῷ. 


ἐν τῷ λαῷ is used for the chosen people 
in LXX. ψευδοπροφῆται. A class of 
False Proohets is frequently mentioned 
inthe O.T. In the earlier ages it is not 
suggested that there was conscious deceit 
on the part of the prophet. His pro- 
phecy is false, if it is proved so by the 
event (Jer. xxviii. g). ‘‘ When a prophet 
lies, without being inspired by a false or 
impotent god, it is because God in His 
anger against Israel’s sin means to destroy 
him, and therefore put into the prophets 
baulving: spirit’. (schulz. O.7. Tk: 
i257). Cf. τ Kings xxii. 5 ff. \ These 

are the prophets who cry ‘“‘ peace, peace,” 
when’ God is really going to bring judg- 
ment. In the later period superstitious 
acts and pagan practices, such as spiritu- 
alism, ventriloquism, professional sooth- 
saying, became common (e.g. Jer. xxvii. 
g; Isa. viii. 19). The cardinal distinction 
between the true and the false prophet lay 
in the moral character of their teaching 
(Jer. xxiii. 21, 22). ψευϑδοδιδάσκαλοι. 
The characteristics of their teaching are 
well-marked in this Epistle. See Intro- 
duction, pp. 115 ff. Compare Phil. iii. 18 
f., ‘‘ enemies of the Cross,” who brought 
tears of shame to the eyes of the Apostle ; 


VOL. V. 9 


IIETPOY B 


133 
ὡς καὶ ἐν Vv. 4, το, 
Jas. 1. 25. 
See 
, = Moulton, 
“πότην ἀρνούμενοι, ἐπάγοντες Pyoleg.74. 
the abuses of the Lord’s Supper in 1 Cor. 
xi.; also Galat. ii. 4, 2 Cor. xi. 13. 
παρεισάξουσιν. What is the force 
of wapa-? The idea of “stealth”? or 
“secrecy ’—* stealthily to introduce”’ 
—is hardly in accord with their character 
described elsewhere as τολμηταὶ av- 
θάϑδεις, δόξας οὐ τρέμουσιν βλασφη- 
μοῦντες (ii. το). Rather the idea seems 
to be of the introduction of false teaching 
alongside the true, whereby the ὁδὸς 
ἀληθείας is brought into disrepute. Cf. 
παρεισενέγκαντες, i. 5. The idea of 
stealth is present in παρεισάκτους 
(Gal. ii, 5). αἱρέσεις. Clearly αἵρεσις 
here is used in. original sense of 
‘tenet’? (“ animus,”  ‘“ sententia ’’) 
(So Spitta, von Soden, Weiss; but 
cf. Zahn., op. cit. ii. 233). In Galat. 
Valk 20s iT Ors, Ἀν τὸν tHE) SENSE 15 
‘‘ dissensions,” arising from such di- 
versity of opinion. It is used in the 
sense of “sect” in Acts v. 17, xv. 5, 
xxiv. 5. The ψευδοδιδάσκαλοι were 
within the Church. Even the “Alogi,” 
who disputed the fourth Gospel in 
second century, were not excommuni- 
cated. They were, as Epiphanius says,. 
‘one of ourselves”. Cf. MME., Expos. 
Feb. 1908. αἱρέσεις ἀπωλείας. The 
Genitive contains the qualifying idea— 
“ corrupting tenets’. Our identification 
with a gréat cause may be maintained, as 
in the case of the false teachers, but per- 
sonal motives may sadly deteriorate, and 
the influence of the life may breed corrup- 
tion, Cf. Ignat. Trall. vi. 1; Eph. vi. 2. 
Kal τὸν Gyop. ... Gpvovpevor. Kal = 
“even”. Cf. Mark i. 27. Ifthe ordinary 
use of ϑεσπύτης in early Christian writers 
is followed here, viz., as referring to 
God, ἀγοράζω would also be used of 
God, who redeemed Israel out of Egypt 
(2 Sam. vii. 23). The reference here, 
however, is to Christ (cf. Mayor, p. xvii.). 
The N.T. use of ayop. is illustrated in τ 
Cor. vi. 20, where reference might be to 
God; but in ib. vii. 23 reference is 
clearly to Christ. Soin Rev.v.g. Cf. 
our Lord’s words in Mark x. 45, about 
“ giving his life a ransom” and Jude v.. 
4. The ‘denial’? seems to have con- 
‘sisted in an inadequate view of the Person 
and Work of Christ, and their relation to 
the problem of human sin. Cf. Epp. of 
Peter, J. H. Jowett, pp. 230 ff. ταχινὴν. 
See note on i. 14. ἐπάγοντες. The 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ B 


134 Ik. 


Ὁ τ Tim. ii. ἑαυτοῖς ταχινὴν ἀπώλειαν " 2. καὶ 


πολλοὶ ἐξακολουθήσουσιν αὐτῶν 
2, 2 Cor, 


i τὶ viii, Tats ἀσελγείαις, δι᾽ ots ἡ ὁδὸς τῆς ἀληθείας βλασφημηθήσεται " 3. 
2, Luke i. ᾿ Ξ ΝΞ > 

ah καὶ " ἐν πλεονεξίᾳ πλαστοῖς λόγοις ὑμᾶς “ ἐμπορεύσονται ᾿ οἷς τὸ 
c Hzek. 


ἘΞ , ” > > a Sipser , 25. κα » ἃ , 

xxvii. 21. Κρίμα ἔκπαλαι οὐκ ἀργεῖ, καὶ ἡ ἀπώλεια αὐτῶν ob “νυστάζει. 4. 
ἃ Acts iii. Re Ate ARE, 7 e , see | Sait ae > Η en | 

τῷι τ Cor. εἰ γὰρ ὃ Θεὸς ἀγγέλων ἁμαρτησάντων οὐκ ἐφείσατο, ἀλλὰ σειραῖς 

leepats KLP, vulg., syrr., boh. +; σειροις ABC, WH, Treg.; σιροις ἐ᾿, Ti. 
The two last are mere variations in spelling: the last gives a different word which 
seems less applicable to fodov. The difficulty is, however, partially explained by 
regarding σειραῖς as suggested by Seopois of Jude 6. σειρος or σιρος is a pit for 
the storage of grain, and so far as known, the word ‘‘does not seem to suggest 


anything awful or terrible’? (Mayor). 


The presumption, considering dependence 


‘of whole chapter on ideas of Jude, is in favour of σειραις. 


middle might have been expected. Cf. v, 
5, where the active is suitably used. 

Ver. 2. ἀσελγείαις. are “acts of 
dasciviousness”’. 686s τῆς ἀληθείας. 
ἀληθεία contains the root-idea of “" gen- 
uineness”’. It combines the ideas of 
‘the knowledge of God and His purposes 
in Christ; and of the human obligation 
to right living that springs from it. ‘“‘ He 
that doeth truth cometh to the light.” 
The writer of 2 Peter is, as always, con- 
cerned to oppose a merely intellectual 
Gnosticism, which has its ultimate fruit 
in immorality. Cf. Ps. cxix. 29, 30. 
βλασφημηθήσεται. The whole Church 
suffered in reputation because of these 


men. Cf. Rom. ii. 24, τ Tim. vi. 1. 
Ver. 3. ἐν is causal. πλεονεξίᾳ = 
“‘covetousness”. Cf. Luke xii. 15. 


πλαστοῖς : here only in N.T., ‘“ manu- 
factured,” ‘‘ feigned,” “artificial”. ép- 
πορεύσονται Originally used in intrans. 
sense = “go a-trading”. Cf. Jas. iv. 
13. Then = “import,’’ in trans. sense. 
Here = “*make gain of,” “exploit”. 
Cf. 2 Cor. ii. 17, 1 Tim. vi. 5. 

ots τὸ κρίμα ἔκπαλαι οὐκ ἀργεῖ: 
‘whose judgment has for long not been 
tnactive,” although there is an appear- 
ance of delay. This delay is the argu- 
ment used by the false teachers. €k- 
παλαι occurs in O.G.1.S., 5845 (ii. A.D.), 
δι᾽ ὧν ἔκπαλαι αὐτὴν (sc. τὴν πατρίδα) 
εὐεργέτ[ησεν] (Cf. iii. 4 and ii. τ, 
ἐπάγοντες ἑαυτοῖς ταχινὴν ἀπώλειαν.) 
For ἀργεῖ see note on i. 8. The judg- 
ment has long been gathering, and is 
impending. νυστάζει. The word used 
of the slumbering virgins in Matt. xxv. 5. 
In Isa. v. 27 it is used of the instruments 
of God’s anger employed against those 
guilty of social abuses. 

Vv. 4-10a. A historical illustration of 
the Divine judgment on the wicked, and 
care of the righteous. 

“God spared not angels who sinned, 


but having cast them into Tartarus, gave 
them over to chains of darkness, reserving 
them for judgment. He spared not the 
ancient world, but guarded Noah, with 
seven others, while the impious world 
was overwhelmed by a flood. So Divine 
judgment was extended to the cities of 
Sodom and Gomorrah, which were over- 
whelmed by ashes, and overthrown by 
earthquake, as an example of what is in 
store for impious persons, while righteous 
Lot was delivered, grieved and wearied 
as he was by the profligate life of the 
lawless. For day after day this man 
with his righteous instincts, in his life 
among them, was vexed with the sight 
and sound of their lawless deeds. In all 
this we have a proof that the Lord 
knows how to deliver the godly out of 
trial, and to keep the ungodly under dis- 
cipline until the day of judgment, especi- 
ally those who follow the polluting lusts 
of the flesh and despise authority.” 

Ver. 4. et yap 6 θεός. . . introducing 
a series of conditional sentences. The 
apodosis is found in οἶδεν κύριος 
...Of v. 9. σειραῖς. No doubt a 
rendering of δεσμοῖς in Jude 6, agree- 
ably to the practice of this writer, who 
is somewhat fond of using rarer words, 
instead of the more commonplace. σειρά 
usually means a “cord”? or “rope” 
(Homer, 11, xxiii., 115, Od. xxii., 175). 
It would seem to mean “ἃ golden 
chain’ in Ὑ]. viti., 19; (25, c/s “Plato: 
Theatetus, i. 53 C. The meaning 
“fetters” is peculiar to 2 Peter (for 
var. lect. σειροῖς, see textual note), 
Taptapwoas = “cast into Tartarus”. 
The verb is a ἅπαξ ey. τάρταρος 
occurs in three passages of LXX. (Job 
xl. 15 (20), xli. 22 (23), Prov. xxiv. 51 
(xxx. 16): but in none of these is there 
any corresponding idea in the Heb- 
rew. The word also occurs in Enoch 
xx. 2, where Gehenna is the place of 


2—7. 


NETPOY B 


135 


{épou! ταρταρώσας παρέδωκεν εἰς κρίσιν τηρουμένους,2 5. Kal dpxa-e Plato, 


tou κόσμου οὐκ ἐφείσατο, ἀλλὰ 


ἐφύλαξεν, κατακλυσμὸν κόσμῳ ἀσεβῶν ὅ ἐπάξας 6. 
Σοδόμων καὶ Γομόρρας τεφρώσας "ἢ" καταστροφῇ κατέκρινεν, ὑπόδειγμα 


μεχλόντων ἀσεβέσιν 3 τεθεικώς, 7. 


A a i a f 
μενον ὑπὸ τῆς τῶν ἀθέσμων ᾿ ἐν ἀσελγείᾳ ἀναστροφῆς épdcato,— 


G. pp. 571. 


1fogov ΜΚ ΒΟΚΙ;Ρ, Ti., Treg., WH; Coots SA. 


‘ , ‘A , 
καὶ δίκαιον Λὼτ καταπονού- 2. 


g Luke xiii. 34, Acts xiv. 27. 


* ὄγδοον 'NGe δικαιοσύνης κήρυκα 695¢, 
ut. 

Kal πόλεις Pelop. ς. 

13, Dem. 


Art. 
absent ii. 
“πο οῖς 
Abbott, J. 


h Matt. xx. 18. iz Pet. iii. 2. 


‘““The latter reading may 


have arisen from a marginal -οὺς intended to connect σειραῖς, but wrongly applied 


to Lopov”’ (Mayor, Ed. p. cxciv.). 


2 rnpoupevous BCKLP, syrh + Ti., Treg., WH; 


SyrP, boh., sah. 


κολαζομενους τηρειν SA, latt., 


ϑασεβεσιν BP, syrh, syrPp, WH; τοις ασεβεσιν sah., boh.; aveBery SACKL, 


vulg., Treg., Ti. 

2 
punishment for apostate Jews, and Tar- 
tarus for the fallen angels. In Homer 
(4... Il. viii. 13) Hades is the place of 
confinement for dead men, and Tartarus 
is the name given to a murky abyss be- 
neath Hades in which the sins of fallen 
Immortals (Kronos, Japetos, and the 
Titans) are punished (cf. Salmond, H.B.D. 
ii. 344 α). Hence 2 Peter uses this word 
in agreement with the Book of Enoch 
and Greek mythology, because he is 
speaking of fallen angels and not of men. 
As regards the cosmology that is here 
implied, it has been suggested that the 
earth is not regarded as flat, but the 
universe is conceived as two concentric 
spheres, the outer heaven, the inner the 
earth. The nether half of heaven is 
Tartarus, and the nether half of the earth 
is Hades (St. Clair, Expositor, July, 1902). 
The use οἱ the word by 2 Peter is remark- 
able as implying an atmosphere of Greek 
thought in the circle in which he moved, 
and for which he wrote. ζόφος in Homer 
is used of the gloom of the nether world, 
Od. xx.) 356, cf. Heb: xil.,, 18. Also 
v. 17 and Jude 6,13. It is implied that 
fallen angels and unrighteous men alike 
undergo temporary punishment until the 
day of their final doom, cf. ver.g. Enoch 
ἘΠ 4, 12; xxviii. 2. 

Ver. 5. ἀρχαίου κόσμου. The article 
is omitted, which is not a mark of illi- 
teracy. This chapter is prophetic in form, 
and the omission of the article is character- 
istic of that style. Cf. Job. iii. το, Judges 
v. 5. (See Mayor, Ed. xxxiv. xxxv.). 
δικαιοσύνης κήρυκα. κηρ. in this sense 
is used in N.T. only here, and in τ Tim. 
ii. 7,2 Tim.i. 11. 2 Peter again borrows 
from Jewish tradition as to the preaching 
‘of Noah. Cf. Jos. Antig.i. 3, 1, Clem. 


Rom. i. 7. κατακλυσμόν, cf. Matt. xxiv. 
38, 39, Luke vii. 27, Gen. vi. 17. ἐπάξας. 
Aorist participle implies co-incident ac- 
tion. “ He saved N... . while he sent, 
etc.” ἐπάγω is used of “setting-on,” 
“letting loose,” e.g. “dogs”. Odyssey, 
xix. 445, Xen. Cyr. x.19. ὄγδοον. “with 
seven others’’. Classical Greek usage is 
toadd αὐτόν. Thereis much difficulty as 
to the significance of the numeral. The 
reference is no doubt to the wumber of 
Noah’s family. The numeral is placed in 
a prominent place in the sentence to lay 
stress on the small number saved out 
of the inhabited world, as a striking ex- 
ample of mercy in the midst of judgment, 
cf. 1 Pet. ili. 20. Cf. P. Petr. iii. 28. ὅτι 
ἐδραγματοκλέπτει τρίτος av (bis), cf. 
Abbott, J. G. § 562 

Ver. 6. πόλεις Σοδ, καὶ Topopp. Not 
genitive of apposition, but cities of the 
district, where Sodom and Gomorrah were 
situated. Cf. Jude 7. X. nai Γ. καὶ ai 


Q 5. 3% a , 
“περὶ αὐτὰς πόλεις καταστροφῇ κατέκρι- 


γεν. καταστροφῇ is dative of instrument, 
‘*condemned them by overthrow’’. Gen. 
xix. 24, 25 seems to imply some further 
destruction after the fire. Perhaps an 
earthquake is meant, a common accom- 
panying phenomenon of volcanic dis- 
turbance. ὑπόδειγμα, + τεθεικώς, 
“constituting them an example to un- 
godly persons of things in store for 
them.” With μελλ. cf. Heb. xi. 20, Col. 
ii. I7. τεφρώσας = “cover up with 
ashes’’ (not “‘ reduce to ashes ’’) —found 
in a description of the eruption of Vesu- 
vius. (Dio. Cass. Ixvi. p. 1094). 

Ver. 7. καταπονούμενον, the word 
applied to the condition of the slave whom 
Moses delivered, Acts vii. 24. It implies 
outward discomfort. a0éopwv. Cf. iii. 17, 


136 


k Infinit. 
with οἶδα 


flETPOY B 


II. 


ὃ, βλέμματι γὰρ καὶ ἀκοῇ Sikatos! ἐνκατοικῶν ἐν αὐτοῖς ἡμέραν ἐξ 


τ Τίπι. 11. ἡμέρας ψυχὴν δικαίαν ἀνόμοις ἔργοις ἐβασάνιξεν,---Ο. οἶδεν Κύριος 


5, Jas. iv. 


vii. 11, 


17, Matt. εὐσεβεῖς ἐκ πειρασμοῦ ἢ ῥύεσθαι, ἀδίκους δὲ εἰς ἡμέραν κρίσεως 


Phil. ἵν. κολαζομένους τηρεῖν, 10. μάλιστα δὲ τοὺς ὀπίσω σαρκὸς ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ 


12,1 


1 a \ Α 
Thess. iv. μιασμοῦ πορευομένους καὶ κυριότητος καταφρονοῦντας. 


4, οἰαβϑβὶ- 
cal. 
1 Luke iv. 22, Col. i. 13, Rom. i. 26. 


τολμηταὶ 


lo δικαιος ΦΑΟΚΙ,Ρ, syrr., Treg., Ti.; om. ο B, vulg., WH. 


“a stronger word than ἄνομος, because 
θεσμός is used especially of a divine or- 
dinance, a fundamental law ”’ (Mayor). 

Ver. 8. βλέμματι yap καὶ ἀκοῇ. Two 
interpretations are possible (1) Instru- 
mental dative after ἐβασάνιζεν. ‘He 
vexed his righteous soul by what he saw 
and heard.” The objections are (a) the 
long interval that separates BA. κιτιλ. 
from ἐβασάνιζεν, (ὁ) that βλέμμα is never 
elsewhere used of the thing seen, but is 
used of sight from the subjective, emo- 
tional, and volitional point of view. 
Hence (2), reading δίκαιος without the 
article, and taking BA. «.7.A. with that 
word, we may translate with the Vulgate 
“a:pectu et auditu justus”. His in- 
stincts of eye and ear were nobler than 
those of the society around him. ἡμέραν 
ἐξ ἡμέρας. “ Day in, day out.” Cf. ἡμέρα 
καθ ἡμέραν in Ps, Ixviii. 19. ἐβασάνιζεν. 
It is somewhat peculiar that the active 
should be used. ‘“ He vexed, distressed 
his righteous soul.”” May it not be that 
in the use of the active a certain sense of 
personal culpability is implied? Lot was 
conscious that the situation was ulti- 
mately due to his own selfish choice (cf. 
von Soden). 

Ver. 9. οἶδεν Κύριος, κιτιλ. Apo- 
dosis to protasis begun in ver. 4. 
πειρασμοῦ. See Mayor’s note on Jas. 
i. 2. The idea here is primarily of those 
surroundings that try a man’s fidelity 
and integrity, and not of the inward 
inducement to sin, arising irom the de- 
sires. Both Noah and Lot were in the 
midst of mockers and unbelievers. This 
πειρασμός is the atmosphere in which 
faith is brought to full development. It 
was a condition even cf the life of Jesus. 
ὑμεῖς δὲ ἐστε οἱ διαμεμενηκότες μετ᾽ ἐμοῦ 
ἐν τοῖς πειρασμοῖς pov (Luke xxii. 
28). It is the word used by St. Luke of 
the Temptation (Luke iv. 13). On the 
one hand, πειρασμός is not to be lightly 
sought (Luke xi. 4), or entered into care- 
lessly (Mark xiv. 38); the situation of 
πειρασμός may itself be the result of sin 
(1 Tim. vi. 9). On the other hand, it is 


a joyous opportunity for the development 
of spiritual and moral strength (Jas, i. 2, 
12). πειρασμός becomes sin only when 
it ceases to be in opposition to the will. 
The word is peculiar to the N.T. 
ἀδίκους δὲ εἰς ἡμέραν κρίσεως κολα- 
Copevous τηρεῖν : ‘to keep the unrigh- 
teous under punishment until the day of 
judgment”’. The reference may be the 
same as in 1 Pet. ili. 19, τοῖς ἐν φυλακῇ 
πνεύμασιν, if we interpret “spirits in 
prison’ as meaning those who had dis- 
obeyed the preaching of Noah, and to. 
whom Christ preached. Cf. Book of 
Enoch, x. 4 f. ἡμέραν κρίσεως. This 
day is also the day of Parousia. The 
same expression is used in iii, 7. It 
is called ἡμέρα κυρίου (iii. 10); 4 τοῦ 
θεοῦ ἡμέρα (ili. 12). Three great results 
are brought about on that day. (1) The 
ungodly will suffer ἀπώλεια (iii. 7; cf. ii. 
I, iii. 16). It is noteworthy that the 
ultimate fate of the fallen angels is 
not described except as κρίσις (ti. 4). 
(2) Dissolution of the material universe by 
fire (iii. 11, ili. 7, ili. 12, 111. το). (3) The 
righteous are promised “ new heavens 
and anewearth’”’. In this new universe, 
or environment, righteousness has its 
home (iii. 13). The difficult passage (i. 
1g), about the day-star, has reference to 
this ἡμέρα κυρίου, when the great Day 
shall dawn, and the sign of it shall cheer 
the hearts of the faithful, and the lamp 
of prophecy will be no longer needed. 
Ver. 10a. μάλιστα δὲ τοὺς ὀπίσω 
σαρκὸς .. . πορευομένους, ‘‘ especially 
those who follow the flesh as their leader’. 
Cf. Matt. iv. 19,1 Tim. v.15. InIsa. Ixv. 
2 we have πορενομένοις. . . ὀπίσω τῶν. 
ἁμαρτιῶν αὐτῶν. The writer now passes 
from the sin of Sodom to the sin of the 
Libertines. ἐπιθυμίᾳ μιασμοῦ. ἐπιθυμίᾳ 
is used of strong desire generally ; “ lust”’ 
in its older meaning. £&.g. Luke xxii. 15. 
μιασμοῦ is a qualitative genitive, as in 
li. I. αἱρέσεις ἀπωλείας : “a polluting 
desire”. κυριότητος καταφρονοῦντας. 
κυρ. cannot be taken in a purely abstract 
sense, ‘‘despising authority”. κυριότης: 


8—II. 


αὐθάδεις, δόξας οὐ τρέμουσιν βλασφημοῦντες. 


> tee A ’ ” > 
ἰσχύϊ καὶ δυνάμει μείζονες ὄντες οὐ 


is used in the abstract sense of the Lord- 
ship of Christ in Didache iv. 1. Honour 
him who speaks the word of God, ὡς 
κύριον, ὅθεν yap 4 κυριότης λαλεῖται, 
ἐκεῖ κύριός ἐστιν. 

As is suggested by this passage in the 
Didache, we may conclude that by 
KUpLOTHTOS καταφρονοῦντας is meant a 
despising of the Lordship of Christ, which 
was the central theme of the apostolic 
teaching and preaching. The writer in 
ver. τοῦ, goes on to speak of their attitude 
towards δόξας, or ‘‘angelic beings”’. 
Cf. Jude 8, κυριότητα δὲ ἀθετοῦσιν, 
ϑόξας δὲ βλασφημοῦσιν. It is true that 
in Col. 1. 16, κυριότητες form one of 
the ranks of angels in the false Gnostic 
teaching, but there is no indication that 
the Libertines here spoken of taught any 
elaborate angelology. On the contrary, 
they spoke lightly of the Unseen Powers 
generally. Their teaching seems to have 
been materialistic in tone. They were 
ὡς ἄλογα ζῷα γεγεννημένα φυσικὰ (ver. 
12)—creatures of natural instinct, not 
employing the higher powers of reason 
(ἄλογα). 

Vv. 10b-14 Further description of the 
False Teachers. ‘“ Presumptuous and ar- 
rogant, they do not shrink from irreverent 
speech about the unseen powers, while 
even angels, who are far superior to these 
false teachers in greatness and might, do 
not dare to bring against these powers an 
irreverent accusation. ‘Their irreverence 
is therefore of an ignorant type, as of un- 
reasoning animals, who are born creatures 
of instinct, and are fitted only for capture 
and destruction. Their destruction will be 
in keeping, and they will be defrauded of 
what is really the wages of fraud. Their 
notion of pleasure is to spend the day 
in delicate living. They are spots and 
blemishes, luxuriating in their pleasures, 
while they feast with you. Their eyes are 
full of adultery, and they are insatiable 
in sin, alluring unstable souls. With 
hearts experienced in covetousness, they 
are children of the curse.” 

Ver. τοῦ. τολμηταὶ αὐθάδεις. av. is 
to be taken as an epithet of τολμηταὶ. 
The idea in τολμ. is of shameless and 
irreverent daring. αὐθάδεις (αὐτὸς and 
ἥδομαι) = “self-willed,”’“‘ arrogant”. In 
I Tim. i. 7, the ἐπίσκοπος must not be 
αὐθάδης, where the thought seems to be 
of irresponsibility in regard to the com- 
munity. Cf. Didache iii. 6, μὴ γίνου 


TIETPOY B 


137 


II, ὅπου ἄγγελοι 
φέρουσιν κατ᾽ αὐτῶν παρὰ 


γόγγυσος " ἐπειδὴ ὁδηγεῖ εἰς τὴν βλασ- 
φημίαν: μηδὲ αὐθάδης μηδὲ πονηρόφρων. 
ἐκ γὰρ τούτων ἁπάντων βλασφημίαι 
γεννῶνται. The false teachers push for- 
ward their views, regardless of conse- 
quences. Cf. P. Amh. 78, 13 f. (ii. A.D.), 
μίου] πλεονεκτῖ ἄνθρωπος ἀ(υ)θάδης. 
ΑΠ audacious man is taking advantage 
of me.” δόξας οὐ τρέμουσιν βλασφη- 
μοῦντες. δόξας is used of Unseen Powers 
whether good or evil. Howcan βλασφημ. 
be used of evil powers? It is obvious 
that we must find some sense for βλασ- 
φημεῖν here; and also in Jude 8, that 
will be applicable to δόξας, apart alto- 
gether from their moral character. In 
Plato, Rep. 381 E, there occurs a passage 
dealing with the popular conception of 
the gods, which holds that they may 
sometimes change their form, and “in 
the likeness of wandering strangers, bodied 
in manifold forms, go roaming from city to 
city ”’ (cf. Homer, Od. xvii. 485). By such 
notions, as taught for example by mothers 
to their children, men may be said, 
“εἰς θεοὺς βλασφημεῖν. Not only are 
these a misrepresentation of the Divine, 
but their tendency is to make light of it, 
belittle it, detract from its dignity. Some 
such sense of BX. seems to be required 
here. The false teachers may have scoffed 
at the idea both of angelic help, and of 
diabolic temptation. Their tendency 
seems to have been to make light of 
the Unseen, to foster a sense of the 
unreality both of sin and of goodness, 
and to reduce the motives of conduct to 
a vulgar hedonism (cf. Mayor’s note, 
Ρ- 74). 

Ver. Il. ὅπου =“ whereas”. The 
interpretation of this verse turns on the 
meaning of κατ᾽ αὐτῶν. Does it refer to 
the false teachers, or to a distinction be- 
tween two sets of angels, which finds an 
illustration in the contest between Michael 
and Satan for the body of Moses? (Jude, 
9). Inthe latter case κατ᾽ αὐτῶν would 
refer to the fallen angels. Another pos- 
sible interpretation is that ἄγγελοι ἰσχύϊ 
καὶ δυνάμει μείζονες ὄντες are a superior 
class of archangels (Spitta), and κατ᾽ 
αὐτῶν would refer to the δόξαι in general. 
Chase suggests that the reference is to 
the false teachers, and angels are re- 
presented as bringing before the Lord 
tidings as to the conduct of created 
beings, whether angels or men (οῤ. cit. 
797 5). 


138 


m Use of 
dat. in- 
stead of 
accus. 
indicates 
progress 
towards 
extinc- 
tion of 


™ Κυρίῳ βλάσφημον κρίσιν. 


prepp. with three cases (Moulton, Proleg. 106). 


Luke v. 25. 


TETPOY B 


ἐν τῇ φθορᾷ αὐτῶν kat φθαρήσονται, 13. ἀδικούμενοι 


II, 


12. οὗτοι δέ, ὡς ἄλογα ζῷα γεγεννημένα 


φυσικὰ εἰς ἅλωσιν καὶ φθοράν, ἐν " οἷς ἀγνοοῦσιν βλασφημοῦντες, 


1 μισθὸν 


ἀδικίας ἡδονὴν ἡγούμενοι τὴν ἐν ἡμέρᾳ τρυφήν, σπίλοι καὶ μῶμοι 


n Roin. x. 14, vi. 21, xiv. 21; John xix. 27, 


1 αδικουμενοι NJ BP, syrh + WH; κομιουμενοι ACKLN¢, boh., spec., syrh + 


ai bnecs 


We may note the tendency in 2 Peter 
exemplified here to put in general terms 
what Jude states in the particular, in the 
story of Michael and Satan. The par- 
ticulars of Jude are omitted (as also the 
name Enoch afterwards) in order to avoid 
direct reference to apocryphal writings. 
Accordingly the sentence, οὐ φέρουσιν 
κατ᾽ αὐτῶν βλάσφημον κρίσιν, is only 
intelligible by reference to Jude 9, where 
Michael does not himself condemn Satan, 
but says ἐπιτ' μήσαι σοι κύριος. Cf. note 
on βλασφημοῦντες, ν. 10. 

Ver. 12. γεγεννημένα dvorka— born 
creatures of instinct’. Instinct is here 
distinguished from the rational centres of 
thought and judgment. They are ἄλογα 
ζῷα. Their chief characteristic is that 
they are ‘‘alive,’’ and have no sense of 
the moral issues of life. Like animals, 
they exist eis ἅλωσιν καὶ φθοράν. ἐν ols 
ἀγνοοῦσιν βλασφημοῦντες -- ἐν τούτοις ἃ 
... “Speaking lightly of things they 
are ignorant of”. Spiritually they are 
incapable. They know not what they do, 
in thus clouding moral issues. év Tq 
φθορᾷ αὐτῶν καὶ φθαρήσονται. Here is 
a subtle example of the dependence of 
this epistle upon Jude. In Jude 10, we 
have ἐν τούτοις φθείρονται, referring to 
ὅσα δὲ φυσικῶς ... ἐπίστανται. The 
sense in 2 Peter is confused, and there 
is no distinction between the two kinds 
of knowledge, although the intended 
meaning in both passages is the same. 
Cf. Rom. viii. 5, 6. 

Ver. 13. ἀδικούμενοι μισθὸν ἀδικίας 
(cf. ν. 12). This playing upon words is 
characteristic of 2 Peter, ἀδικεῖν has 
usually the sense of “doing harm to’’ 
(cf. Acts xxxv. 10; Galat. iv. 12). Here 
it would seem to mean “ being defrauded 
of the wages of fraud,” or “being done 
out of the wages of wrong-doing”’. It 
has been customary to see in this phrase 
an illustration of the irresponsible use of 
words in 2 Peter. ‘‘ Another example 
of the author’s love of far-fetched and 
~stificial expressions’? (Mayor). In P. 


Eleph., however 27a*4f (iii. B.c.), the 
writers ask for a receipt with reference 
toa certain business transaction. τούτου 
δὲ γενομένου ἐσόμεθα οὐκ ἠδικημένοι 
“this having been arranged, we shall not 
be defrauded”’. To this may be added 
Mayor’s citation of Plut. Cato Mi. 17 
(p. 766) εὑρὼν χρέα παλαιὰ τῷ δημοσίῳ 
πολλοὺς ὀφείλοντας καὶ πολλοῖς τὸ 
δημόσιον, ἅμα τὴν πόλιν ἔπαυσεν ἀδι- 
κουμένην καὶ ἀδικοῦσαν. The accusative 
vet after ἄδικ. is very unusual. In classical 
writers it is found only with ἀδίκημα. 
μισθὸν ἀδικίας suggests the experience of 
Balaam, of whom the same expression 
is used in ver. 15, who never received his 
promised hire from Balak (Num. xxiv. 11). 
Death deprives the false teachers of all 
their reward. For significance of the 
name ‘ Balaam,’’ in connexion with the 
false teachers, see Introduction, p. 118. 
ἡδονὴν in N.T. only in a bad sense, cf. 
Luke - viii. 14, Tit. 11. 3, Jas: v.13: 
τρυφή only in N.T. in Luke vii. 25 where 
it is used of “ delicate living,’’ a luxurious 
life, but with no special blame attached. 
The word is also used of gifts of wisdom 
in Prev. iv. 9, cf. Ps. xxxvi. 8, “the river 
of thy pleasures”, Eden is called παρά- 
δεισος τῆς τρυφῆς, Gen. ii. 15, iii. 13, 24. 
ἐν ἡμέρᾳ “in the day-time,”, ‘in broad 
day-light”’. σπίλοι καὶ μῶμοι, cf. Ephes. 
V. 27, 2 Peti iil. 14, 1 Pet i. τὸ, Judea, 
μῶμος “reproach,” ‘‘disgrace”. Cf, 
Hort. on 1 Pet. i. 19, where he traces the 
way in which μῶμος and ἄμωμος, came 
to be used with superficial meaning of 
‘*blemish,” cf. Ephes. i. 4, v. 27, Heb. 
IX. 14. ἐντρυφῶντες : “ to be luxurious,” 
cf. Xen. Hell. iv. 1, 30. ἐν ταῖς ἀπάταις 
αὐτῶν : to be taken with évrpud. ἀπάτη 
is a favourite word of Hermas (Mand. 
viii. 5) and is frequently joined by him 
with τρυφή (Mand. xi. 12 and throughout 
Parable 6). According to Deissmann, 
ἀπάτη in popular Hellenistic has the 
meaning “ pleasure”’. Cf. Matt. xiii. 22 
= Mark iv. 19 (Luke viii. 14), (see his 
Hellenisierung des semitischen Monotheis- 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ B 


{12—I5. 


iS? 


évtpupdvres ἐν ταῖς ἀπάταις ' αὐτῶν συνευωχούμενοι ὑμῖν, 14. 0 Matt. x. 
10, Heb. 


ὀφθαλμοὺς ἔχοντες μεστοὺς “ μοιχαλίδος καὶ ἀκαταπαύστους 5 iii. τ, 


PG 4 ὃ ’ \ > , ΠΝ , Eph. ii. 
ἁμαρτίας, δελεάζοντες ψυχὰς ἀστηρίκτους, καρδίαν γεγυμνασμένην 12. 

P , >” , , snl. pt Peteriiv; 
πλεονεξίας ἔχοντες, κατάρας τέκνα" 15. καταλείποντες εὐϑεῖαν 1, Jas. i. 


A = “ aA I3. 
ὁδὸν ἐπλανήθησαν, ἐξακολουθήσαντες TH ὁδῷ τοῦ Βαλαὰμ τοῦ Βόσορ 54 Heb. iii. 
12. 


tamataits SACKLP, syrh (mg. ayamats), WH, Ti.; ἀγαπαις ΑΒ, sah., 501Ρ 
+. Treg., WHm. At first sight it would seem probable that 2 Peter has misread 
ἄγαπαις in Jude 12. Confusion is common in MSS. of O.T. between ἄγαπαω and 
ἄπαταω, ἀγαπὴ and ἄπατη (e.g., Ps. Ixxviii. 36). Yet awary, ἄπαταω has been 
proved to be the correct reading in many cases. αὐτων here is an argument in its 
tavour. Nestle (of. cit. pp. 324 ff.) and Zahn (of. cit. ii. p. 235 f.) argue strongly 
for ayatrats and omission of υμιν (συνευωχουμενοι = “ feasting with one another ”’) 
(Mayor, Ed. cxcvii). 


Ξακαταπαυστους $ECKLP, 13, 31, Ti., Treg.; ακαταπαστους AB, WH. The 
latter reading ‘‘ may have originated in a faulty pronunciation on the part of the 
reader, or the v may have been accidentally omitted at the end of the line, as in B, 
where one line ends with wa- and the next begins with -~rovs ”’ (Mayor, Ed. cxcvii. 
ε΄. Moulton, Proleg. p. 47). 

3 Βοσορ SCACKLP, boh., syrh, Ti., Treg.; Βεωρ B, syrp, sah., WH, Weiss; 
Bewopoop ἃ. There can be little doubt that Booop's the correct reading. The 
reading of ${ is manifestly due toa combination of Βοσορ and a marginal correc- 
tion -ewp. Zahn. (op. cit. ii. p. 292) says that everywhere in LXX, Josephus, Philo, 
only the forms Beop or Batop occur, and that Βοσορ is inexplicable except as a mis- 
take on the part of 2 Peter due to ‘‘ imperfect pronunciation or defective hearing ”’. 
Nestle, however (of. cit. p. 244), after Holmes-Parsons, cites υἱὸν του Βοσορ in the 
Georgian version of Jos. xiii. 22. Βοσορ also occurs as name of a place in Deut. 
iv. 43, I Sam. xxx. 9, 1 Macc. v. 26. ‘The support of the ordinary name by B 
against the other MSS. may be compared with its support of Σιμων against Συμεων 


in i, τ᾽ (Mayor, Ed. cxcviii.). 


mus, (Neue Fahrb. f. d. Klass, Altertum, 
1903), p. 165, n. 5). 

Ver. 14. ἀκαταπαύστους ἀμαρτίας. 
For use of genitive with this verb, cf. 1 
Pet. iv. τ See Grammatical Note. 
δελεάζοντες. Cf. v. 18 and Mayor’s 
note on Jas. i. 14, ‘“‘entice or catch bya 
bait”. κατάρας τέκνα. Cf. τέκνα ὑπα- 
κοῆς, I Pet. i. 14. 

Vv. 15, 16. Example of Balaam. 
“They have left the straight way and 
wandered from it, having followed the 
way of Balaam, who loved the ways of 
wickedness, and was rebuked for his 
transgression, when a dumb ass spoke 
with a man’s voice, and forbade the in- 
fatuation of the prophet.” 

Ver. 15. τῇ ὁδῷ τοῦ Βαλαὰμ. The 
comparison of the conduct of the False 
Teachers to that of Balaam is significant 
as determining their character and motive 
(see Introduction, pp. 115 ff.). The 
writer of 2 Peter takes the miraculous 
narrative in Numbers xxii. 21-35 literally. 
It is no disparagement of the value of the 
illustration that we, in our day, can no 
longer do so. Balaam had the gift of 
real spiritual vision. He is described in 


Numbers xxiv. 36 as one ‘‘ whose eye 
was closed,” i.e. to outer things, and 
also as one “ which seeth the vision of 
the Almighty, falling down and having 
his eyes open,”’ i.e. to spiritual vision. 
Balaam was one who allowed the greed 
of gain to become stronger than the 
prophetic impulse. He is conscious that 
he is tempting God, and an evil con- 
science makes him irritable. He fears 
lest God may yet interfere to rob him of 
his reward. When the ass starts aside 
he beats it, but ultimately his passion is 
subdued by the momentary triumph of 
his higher spiritual instincts, when he 
begins to suspect that in the stubbornness 
of the animal there is really the power 
of God exercised to hinder him in his 
course. The angel with the drawn sword 
is often the form that men’s religion takes 
who are disobeying the voice of con- 
science. ‘ There is a strange depth of 
meaning in the appealing eye of an ill- 
treated animal. It is an appeal, in the 
first place, to whatever remnant of pity 
and generosity may still survive in the 
heart of the man who ill-treats it, but it 
is an appeal, in the second place, to the 


140 


ΠΡΟ B 


Il. 


ὃς μισθὸν ἀδικίας ἠγάπησεν, 16. ἔλεγξιν δὲ ἔσχεν ἰδίας παρα- 


νομίας - ὑποζύγιον ἄφωνον ἐν ἀνθρώπου φωνῇ φθεγξάμενον ἐκώλυσεν 


‘ A Ve , 
τὴν τοῦ προφήτου παραφρονίαν. 


yo , > \ om” 
I7. οὗτοί εἰσιν πηναὶ ayudpor 
͵ 


»“" ti} 
καὶ ὁμίχλαι ὑπὸ λαίλαπος ἐλαυνόμεναι, ots ὁ ζόφος τοῦ σκότους 


τετήρηται. 


18. ὑπέρογκα γὰρ ματαιότητος φθεγγόμενοι δελεάζου- 


σιν ἐν ἐπιθυμίαις σαρκὸς ἀσελγείαις τοὺς dAiyws! ἀποφεύγοντας τοὺς 
ἐν πλάνῃ ἀναστρεφομένους, 19. ἐλευθερίαν αὐτοῖς ἐπαγγελλόμενοι, 


᾿ολιγως ABNe, vg., syrr., sah., boh., Treg., Ti., WH; οντως 
would require aor. ; αποφυγοντας (‘‘ clean escaped”’ A.V.), read by KLP. 


NWCKLP; ovras 
In the 


MSS. ovtws is hardly distinguishable from oAvyws (Mayor, Ed. cxcviii.). 


justice of the God who made them both, 
a cry of which we may be sure it has 
entered into the ears of the Lord of 
Sabaoth. When animals are put to un- 
necessary suffering, either in the shambles 
or as beasts of burden, or in the interests 
of science or sport, or for any other 
reason, cases are Sure to arise in which 
we may justly apply the words of our 
Epistle, and say of such poor tortured 
creatures that with their dying gaze, no 
less clearly than if they had spoken with 
man’s voice, they forbade the madness 
of their torturers’? (Mayor, p. 203). Cf. 
F. W. Robertson, Sermons, Ser. iv. pp. 
40 f. 

Ver. 16. ἔλεγξιν δὲ ἔσχεν, a periphrasis 
for the passive of ἐλέγχω, = “ was re- 
buked”’. ἰδίας παρανομίας, emphatic, 
‘‘his own transgression’’. Two inter- 
pretations of ἰδίας are possible. (1) The 
παρανομ. is a characteristic trait in 
Balaam (Keil. Weiss). (2) As prophet, 
Belaam was expected to do and teach 
Ged’s law. He whose duty it is to 
rebuke others is himself rebuked for his 
own transgression’ (Hundhausen, Wie- 
singer). σπαρανομία = “4 particular 
transgression”? as distinct from ἀνομία 
= ‘disobedience in general”. παρα- 
φρονίαν, “infatuation”. Balaam is pro- 
ceeding against what he knows to be 
the Divine will. 

Vv. 17-19. The Libertines ave them- 
selves slaves. ‘‘ They are like waterless 
wells, and mists that the wind disperses. 
For them is reserved the fate of gloomy 
darkness. They utter ponderous no- 
things, and allure through their lusts 
those who were just escaping from the 
temptations of heathen life. Promising 
freedom to others, they are themselves 
slaves of corruption. Every one is a 
slave to that which has mastered 
him.” | 

Ver. 17. πηγαὶ . . . ἐλαυνόμεναι. It 
is interesting to compare the expressions 


in 2 Peter here with Jude 12. It would 
appear as though he had felt that νεφέλαι 
ἄνυδροι was a contradiction in terms, 
and instead he substituted πηγαὶ. λαί- 
λαπος is a strong expression = “ gale,”’ 
a “storm of wind’. Cf. Mk. iv. 37, 
Lk. viii. 23. οἷς ὁ ζόφος. . . τετήρηται 
is somewhat out of place here, and is 
used appropriately of meteors in Jude 13. 

Ver. 18 ὑπέρογκα. Cf. Jude 16. 
No doubt the reference is to the use of 
Gnosticterms. ματαιότης, used specially 
of moral insincerity. Cf. ματαίας ava- 
στροφῆς, ‘‘ heartless conduct,” r P. i. 18. 
There is no corresponding reality behind 
their words. σαρκὸς, to be taken with 
ἀσελγείαις, which is in apposition to 
ἐπιθυμίαις. τοὺς ὀλίγως ἀποφεύγοντας : 
“those who are just escaping”’; who 
have been impressed with Christian truth, 
and have had strength to separate them- 
selves from their old surroundings and 
customs ; but are led to return through 
the compromises suggested by the false 
teachers. The phenomenon is not un- 
common in all missionary work, of men 
who have escaped from ‘“ Gentile vices, 
but are not yet established in Christian 
virtues” (Bigg). τοὺς ἐν πλάνῃ ἀναστρε- 
φομένους = governed by ἀποφεύγοντας : 
“(escaping from) those who live in 
error ’’; 1.6. from their old heathen com- 
panionships. ‘There is great passion 
in the words. Grandiose sophistry is 
the hook, filthy lust is the bait, with 
which these men catch those whom the 
Lord had delivered, or was delivering” 
(Bigg). 

Ver. 19. ἐλευθερίαν. Doubtless that 
Antinomianism is indicated to which the 
doctrine of Grace has ever been open. 
Cf. Galat. v. 13. It arises from the ever- 
recurring confusion of liberty and license. 
The training of conscience is contem- 
poraneous with the growth of Christian 
character. The Pauline teaching, which 
abrogated external legality, was open to 


16---22. 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ B 


141 


αὐτοὶ δοῦλοι ὑπάρχοντες τῆς φθορᾶς: ᾧ γάρ τις ἥττηται, τούτῳ τ Acts xi. 17 


δεδούλωται. 


πρώτων. 
αὐτοῖς ἁγίας ἐντολῆς" 


abuse, and might easily be dangerous 
to recent converts from heathenism. 
φθορᾶς. See Mayor’s note, ed. p. 175. 
φθορά is that gradual decay of spiritual 
and moral sense that follows on wilful 
self-indulgence. ¢ γάρ .. . διδούλωται. 
Cf. Rom. vi. 16, viii. 21, John viii. 34. 

Vv. 20-23. The consequences of fall- 
ing away. ‘‘ The case of their victims 
is a serious one. They have escaped 
from the pollutions of the world through 
tthe knowledge of Jesus Christ, and are 
once more entangled and worsted by 
these. Their last state becomes worse 
than the first. It were better for them 
not to have known the way of righteous- 
ness, than in spite of such knowledge, to 
depart from the holy commandment com- 
‘mitted to them. They illustrate the 
truth of the proverb: ‘the dog that 
turned back to his own vomit, and 
‘the sow that went to bathe to wallowing 
in the mud’.” 

Ver. 20. Here, again, yap loosely 
introduces the subject of the victims 
allured by the false teachers away from 
‘their former faith. τὰ μιάσματα τοῦ 
κόσμου. (Lev. vii. 8, Jer. xxxix. 34), 
occurs only here in N.T. In LXX the 
word seems to have a technical religious 
sense, the profanation of flesh by ordinary 
use which is set apart for sacrifice. This 
sense lingers here. The body is sacred 
to God, and to give licentious rein to the 
passions is μίασμα. Cf. μιασμός, v. το, 
and μιαίνω, Jude 8. τοῦ κόσμου is the 
world in the sense of the heathen society 


-and its practises. ἐπιγνώσει. See note 
oni. 2. τούτοις is governed by ἐμπλακ- 
έντες = “‘entangled by these”. Cf. 2 


Tim. ii. 4, γέγονεν αὐτοῖς, κιτιλ. Cf. 
Matt. xii. 45, Luke xi. 26, and Heb. vi. 


4-8, x. 26. 

Ver. 21. ὁδὸν τῆς ϑικαιοσύνης. Also 
called ‘‘the way of truth,” ii. 2, ‘ the 
‘straight way,” li. 15. ἐντολῆς. Else- 


where in N.T. the singular is used to 
‘mean a particular precept. Cf. Rom. 
Wile 22,) 0 Lim.) vi. τὴν tis ‘charac- 
‘teristic of this writer to emphasise the 


21. κρεῖττον yap "ἦν αὐτοῖς "μὴ ἐπεγνωκέναι τὴν ὁδὸν 
τῆς δικαιοσύνης ἢ ἐπιγνοῦσιν ὑποστρέψαι ἐκ τῆς παραδοθείσης 
22. συμβέβηκεν αὐτοῖς τὸ τῆς ἀληθοῦς 


(Rec.). 


20. εἰ γὰρ ἀποφυγόντες TA μιάσματα τοῦ κόσμου ἐν 5 Rom. ix. 
ἐπιγνώσει τοῦ κυρίου καὶ σωτῆρος Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, τούτοις " δὲ πάλιν 
ἐμπλακέντες ἡττῶνται, γέγονεν αὐτοῖς τὰ ἔσχατα χείρονα τῶν 


, 2 Cor. 
bn 
Matt.xxv, 
27, XXvi. 
9, 24, 
Arist. 
Nub. 1215, 
Xen. 
Anab. 7, 
7. 40. 

t Luke 
Xvil. 1 (om. (?) rové). 


aspect of Christianity, not only as faith, 
but as the moral law ἁγίας ἐντολῆς. 
Cf. i. 5. ἐν τῇ πίστει ὑμῶν τὴν ἀρετήν. 
A strong ethical note pervades the teach- 
of 2 Peter. 

Ver. 22. τὸ τῆς ἀληθοῦς παροιμίας: 
‘‘the content of the true proverb” has 
been ‘‘ verified,” or ‘realised ”’ in their 
case. The first proverb is found in 
Prov. xxvi. Ir. The second is ap- 
parently not derived from a Hebrew 
source. Both are quoted familiarly in 
an abbreviated form (cf. WM. p. 443). 
The interpretation of the second is an 
exegetical crux. Bigg takes λουσαμένη 
= ‘having bathed itselfin mud”’. The 
sense is, “not that the creature has 
washed itself clean in water (so appar- 
ently the R.V.), still less that it has been 
washed clean (as A.V.), and then returns 
to the mud; but that having once bathed 
in filth it never ceases to delight in it”’. 
This, however, is to force the meaning 
of λουσαμένη, which is consistently used 
of washing with water. Again, the point 
ot the proverb is to illustrate τὰ ἔσχατα 
χείρονα τῶν πρώτων. The dupes of the 
false teachers were cleansed and returned 
to pollution. 

The question is important whether 
λουσαμένη is Middle or Passive? Dr. 
Rendel Harris (Story of Ahikar, p. lxvii.) 
may have discovered the original proverb 
in the following, appearing in some texts 
of Ahikar. ‘ My son, thou hast behaved 
like the swine which went to the bath 
with people of quality, and when he 
came out, saw a stinking drain, and went 
and rolled himself in it”. If this be the 
source of the παροιμία, A. is Middle 
(Moulton, Proleg. pp. 238-39). 

A friend of my own, with a knowledge 
of animals, tells me that the pig is often 
washed in certain forms of dishealth, to 
open the pores of the skin. The animal, 
being unprotected by hair, finds the 
sun’s heat disagreeable, and wallows 
again in the mud for coolness. The 
dried mud protects the skin from the 
rays. βόρβορος found only here and in 


142 


u Rone XX. 
25, Jas.iv. Ἄ 
1 Cor, vii. μένη εἰς κυλισμὸν βορβόρου. 


«- 
tn) 
m= 
Qa 
Ὁ 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ B 


Ill. 


, -, 
" παροιμίας, Κύων ἐπιστρέψας ἐπὶ τὸ ἴδιον ἐξέραμα, καί Ὗς ὕλουσα- 


III. 1. Ταύτην ἤδη, ἀγαπητοί, δευτέραν ὑμῖν γράφω ἐπιστολήν, 


use of 5ο- "μνησθῆναι τῶν προειρημένων ῥημάτων ὑπὸ τῶν ἁγίων προφητῶν 


called 
epexe- 
getical 
infinitive 


καὶ τῆς τῶν ἀποστόλων ὑμῶν ἐντολῆς τοῦ κυρίου Kal σωτῆρος, 3. 
τοῦτο πρῶτον ” γινώσκοντες ὅτι ἐλεύσονται ἐπ᾽ ἐσχάτων τῶν ἡμερῶ- 


see Μουϊ- - 5 ~ 2 “ Ri ΤΑ PR > ἢ > , 
ἐν ἐμπαιγμονῇ ἐμπαῖκται κατὰ τὰς ἰδίας ἐπιθυμίας αὐτῶν πορευόν 


ton, Pro- 
leg. pp. 
203-204. frais bk 
b Col. iii. 16, 2 Cor. vii. 5, ix. 10, Phil. i. 29. 


Jer. xxxvili. 6. Cf. Acta Thomae, 53. 
εἶδον βόρβορον . . . καὶ ψυχὰς ἐκεῖ 
κυλιομένας. In the Legends of Pela- 
gia, which, though late, are written in 
good vernacular Greek, both noun and 
corresponding verb are found. ἐλθοῦσα 
περιστερὰ μελάνη καὶ βεβορβορωμένη 
περιεπέτατό μοι, καὶ τὴν δυσωδίαν τοῦ 
βορβόρου αὐτῆς οὐκ ἠδυνάμην φέρειν. 
(Die Pelag. Legend., ed. Usener, p. 21). 
Bishop Wordsworth suggested that the 
double proverb is an inexact quotation 
of two iambic lines— 


2 5 ΄ ey ΄ , 
εἰς ἴδιον ἐξέραμ᾽ ἐπιστρέψας κύων 
λελουμένη θ᾽ ὗς εἰς κύλισμα βορβόρου 


If he is right, 2 Pet. cannot be charged 
with the use of the two rare words, 
βορβόρου and ἐξέραμα. Bigg suggests 
(ed., p. 228) that the Proverbs of Solomon 
had been unified by some Jewish 
paraphiast, and this one of the pig added 
to the canonical collection. 

CuHapTER III.—Vv. 1-4. Prophets and 
apostles have warned us that de- 
lay will lead to denial of the Second 
Advent. 

“Tam now writing my second letter 
to you. In both I seek to rouse you to 
honest reflection on the words formerly 
spoken by the holy prophets, and on the 
commandment of our Lord delivered by 
your missionaries. Especially realise 
the truth of their warning, that there 
will come in the last days scoffers, with 
scoffing questions, walking after their 
own lusts, and saying, ‘ Where is the pro- 
mise of His appearing? For,’ say they, 
‘from the time the fathers fell asleep, 
everything remains as it has been from 
the beginning of creation ’.”’ 

Ver. 1. For ἤδη with numeral, cf. 
John xxi. 14. δευτέραν ἐπιστολήν. Does 
this refer to r Peter? See Introduction, 


p. 113. ἐν ats: ‘in both of which,” 
constructio ad sensum. S.eyelpw... 
ὑπομνήσει: cf. i. 13. 


εἰλικρινῆ: cf. x Cor. v. 8, 2 Cor. i. 12, 
ii. 17, Phil. i. τος εἰλικρινῆ διάνοιαν is a 
technical philosophic term used by Plato. 
Phaed. 66 A =‘‘pure reason,”’ such as 
the geometer employs. In Phaed. 81 C, 
εἰλικρινὴς ψυχή is opposed to ψ. μεμιασ- 
μένη καὶ ἀκάθαρτος. 2 Peter here cannot 
be acquitted of a confusion in the use of 
philosophic terms, probably picked up 
loosely in conversation. At the same 
time, διάνοια is also used in the philo- 
sophic sense of ψυχή in Gen. xvii. 17, 
Deut. vi. 5, Num. xv. 39; also in N.T. 
Coloss. i. 21, I Pet. i. 13. εἰλικρινής is 
of doubtful etymology, and signifies ethi- 
cal purity, a mind uncontaminated and 
unwarped by sensual passion. The oppo- 
site state is described in Plato, Phaed. 


81, “She thinks nothing true, but what. 


is bodily, and can be touched and seen, 
and eaten and drunk, and used for men’s 
lusts ”’. 

Ver. 2. Borrowed from Jude 17. 
μνησθῆναι : epexegetical infinitive. See 
grammatical note. καὶ τῆς τῶν ἀποσ- 
τόλων, κιτιλ. Double possessive geni- 
tive ““ of the Lord’s command delivered by 
your apostles’. Chase (of. cit. p. 811 a) 
suggests that διά should be inserted after 
τῆς, and compares the title of the Didache, 
διδαχὴ κυρίου διὰ τῶν δώδεκα ἀποσ- 
τόλων τοῖς ἔθνεσιν. évrodky=teaching οἱ 
our Lord on the fulfilment of the moral 
law, cf. ii. 21, John xii. 50. ἀποστόλων : 
Are the Twelve meant? cf. Introd. pp. 103- 
4. Probably at. signifies just those from 


whom they received the first knowledge of 


the gospel, accredited missionaries of the 
Church. The word is used of Epaphro- 
ditus, Phil. ii. 25, and of other than 
apostles, 2 Cor. viii. 23. 

Ver. 3. τοῦτο πρῶτον γινώσκοντες. 
Accusative is required, but all MSS. have 
nominative, cf. Jude 18. ἐπ᾽ ἐσχάτων 
TOV ἡμερῶν. 
signs of the approach of the end, cf. 1 
John ii. 18. ἐν ἐμπαιγμονῇ ἐμπαῖκται > 


Mockers are one of the 


te MB 


I—6. 


NETPOY B 


143 


‘ a 5 ΠΩΣ τε αι ee 
wevot, 4. καὶ λέγοντες Ποῦ ἐστὶν ἡ ἐπαννελία τῆς παρουσίας “αὐτοῦ; ς τ John ii. 


ἀφ᾽ ἧς yup οἱ πατέρες ἐκοιμήθησαν, πάντα οὕτως “ διαμένει ἀπ᾽ 6. 


ἀρχῆς κτίσεως. 


ἊΣ a fal - -“ 
ἧσαν ἔκπαλαι καὶ γῆ ἐξ ὕδατος καὶ 8: ὕδατος συνεστῶσα τῷ τοῦ 
Θεοῦ “λόγῳ: 6. δι᾽ ὧν ὁ τότε κόσμος ὕδατι κατακλυσθεὶς ἀπώλετωη- 


ἐμπαίκτης is an unclassical form. οἴ. 
Mark xv. 20. ‘his verse is not part of 
the prophetic or apostolic message of ver. 
2, but a particular caution of the writer, 
based on Jude. 

Ver. 4. ποῦ ἐστὶν, «.t.A. The com- 

ing ot our Lord in the near future was 
evidently an integral part of the apostolic 
teaching, cf. i. 16. ‘‘There is no sure 
evidence that Jesus sought to undermine 
the assumption of His followers, that the 
tural ytory would be manifested in their 
day ; and even this we may fairly qualify 
with the remembrance that amain motive 
of the principal eschatological discourse, 
reported by the Synoptists, is to warn 
the disciples against premature expecta- 
tions” (J.H- Muirhead, Rschatology of 
Yesus. pp. 126, 127). τῆς παρουσίας: 
See note on i. 16. ἀφ᾽ ἧς yap, κιτ.λ. 
‘The fathers,’” must mean those of the 
preceding generation, in whose lite-time 
the παρουσία was expected. ottws=in 
statu quo. am ἀρχῆς κτίσεως, 1.¢., 
“contrary to all previous human ex- 
perience”. The Teaching of our Lord 
Himself in one aspect would imply 
that the actual παρουσία, would be at- 
tended with no outward previous dis- 
turbance of life to act as a warning. 
Men would be engaged in their ordinary 
occupations and pleasures (Matt. xxiv. 
36-42). The development and ripening 
of the moral and spiritual issues of men’s 
lives are often not outwardly apparent 
(cf. Paget’s “ Studies in the Christian 
Character,’—‘‘ The Hidden Issues,” pp. 
89 ff). 
Wy. 5-7. The first part of the argu- 
ment against the scoffers. ‘‘It is not 
true that the course of the world is un- 
changing. They have wilfully forgotten 
that the heavens existed originally, and 
the earth was formed out of water, and 
by means of water, by the Word of God. 
By th 5 very water and Word the world, 
as it then was, was overwhelmed and 
perished. The present heavens and 
earth, by the same Word, are treasured 
up for fire, being reserved for the day 
when impious men shall meet their doom 
and destruction.” 


5. λανθάνει yao αὐτοὺς τοῦτο θέλοντας ὅτι οὐρανοὶ 


12 2 John 


ἃ John xv. 
27, Vili. 
58, 1 John 
ili. 8, Jer. 
ies: Ps. 
Ixxxix. 2. 

e Rom. iii. 
24, Eph. 
ii. 8. 


> 


Ver. 5. λανθάνει γὰρ αὐτοὺς τοῦτο. 
‘‘ This escapes their notice.” τοῦτο is 
nominative. θέλοντας “ “wilfully ”’ +‘ of 
their own purpose”’. ἔκπαλαι (cf. note, 
ii. 3): “originally,” 1.6. before the crea- 
tion of the world. The Rabbinical school 
of Shammai held that Gen. i. 1, ἐν ἀρχῇ 
ἐποίησεν ὁ θεὸς τὸν οὐρανὸν Kat THY γῆν᾽ 
meant that the heaven was in existence 
before the six days’ work, 1.6. ἔκπαλαι. 
Perhaps this notion is present here. 
ἐξ ὕδατος καὶ δι᾽ ὕδατος. Two kinds 
of water are meant. The first may refer 
to the primeval watery chaos—“ the face 
of the waters ” (Gen. i. 2). The secord 
is perhaps connected with the formation 
of the dry land by ‘‘the gathering to- 
gether of the waters into one place” 
(Gen. i.g). But the meaning is obscure 
(cf. Mayor, ed. Ixxxili.; Chase, of. cit. 
797). ovveot@oa=‘' wasformed’’. Cf. 
Philo, i. p. 330. ἐκ γῆς καὶ ὕδατος καὶ. 
ἀέρος καὶ πυρὸς συνέστη ὅδε ὁ κόσμος. 

The above interpretation is in sub- 
stantial agreement with Alford’s, who 
distinguishes ‘‘the waters above the 
firmament,’’ and ‘the fountains of the 
great deep”. The Hebrew had no 
notion of evaporation. ‘The rivers run 
into the sea, and the water returns sub- 
terraneously to their sources again (Ec- 
ΟΙΡΈ 15. ἡ: 

Ver. 6. δι᾽ ὧν. Μαγοσ δηά Schmeidel, 
against the evidence of nearly all manu- 
scripts, read δι᾽ ὅν.. Thisis rendered un- 
necessary (1) if the above rendering of 
ἐξ ὕδατος κιτ.λ. is taken, and the plural 
δι᾿ ὧν refers to the two waters. δι᾽ ὅν 
would refer to λόγῳ alone, or (2) if δι’ 
ὧν reiers to ὑδάτων and λόγῳ taken to- 
gether, which would in some ways suit 
the sense of the whole passage better. 
The ialse teachers had ignored the 
agency of the Divine word. κατακλυ- 
oeis; am. Aey. in N.T.; found several 
times in P.Tebt. e.g. 54} (B.c. 86) 
[ὥστε] - - - συμβεβηκότων κατακλυσθῆ- 
vat. “80 {παῖ in consequence of what 
happened, it was flooded’’ ; 5657 (late ii. 
B.C.) yetv[wolke δὲ περὶ τοῦ κατακεκ- 
λῦσθαι τὸ πεδίον “but know about our 
plain having been inundated”. 


144 


TIIETPOY B 


Ill. 


ε δὲ A > ‘ ‘oe a aA eats L λό θ , 78 
7. ol δὲ νῦν οὐρανοὶ καὶ ἡ γῆ τῷ αὐτῷ 1 λόγῳ τεθησαυρισμένοι εἰσὶν 
πυρὶ τηρούμενοι εἰς ἡμέραν κρίσεως καὶ ἀπωλείας τῶν ἀσεβῶν 


ἀνθρώπων. 


ἡμέρα παρὰ Κυρίῳ ὡς χίλια ἔτη καὶ χίλια ἔτη ὡς ἡμέρα μία. 


ὃ. Ἕν δὲ τοῦτο μὴ λανθανέτω ὑμᾶς, ἀγαπητοί, ὅτι μία 


9. 


οὐ βραδύνει Κύριος τῆς ἐπαγγελίας, ὥς τινες βραδύτητα ἡγοῦνται, 


f WM. iii. 
§ xix. 2 
(b). 


πάντας εἰς μετάνοιαν χωρῆσαι. 


ἀλλὰ μακροθυμεῖ εἰς ὑμᾶς, μὴ βουλόμενός τινας ἀπολέσθαι ἀλλὰ 


10. Ἥξει δὲ ἡμέρα Κυρίου ὡς 


τ τῳ αὐτῳ ABP, vulg., sah., boh., WH, Τί, ; τῷ αὐτου ΟΚΙ,, syrr., Treg. 


Ver. 7. πυρὶ τηρούμενοι. According 
to the Jewish conception of the rainbow 
promise, water would not again be the 
destructive agency. The heaven and the 
earth are reserved for destruction by fire. 
τεθησαυρισμένοι : “setapart for”. The 
writer means that both the rainbow pro- 
mise and the delay are not to be regarded 
as implying that there will be no more 
great cosmical changes. 

The idea of the association ofa great 
cosmical change with the coming of 
Christ is an interesting one. It involves 
the question of our environment when 
the natural is exchanged for the spiritual 
body. This writer evidently expects not 
complete annihilation of the present en- 
vironment, but a ‘‘new heaven and a 
new earth, wherein dwelleth righteous- 
ness’’ (v. 13). St. Paul speaks of ‘the 
deliverance of the creation itself from the 
bondage of corruption into the glory of 
the liberty of the children of God”. 
‘We are not informed as to the nature 
of our future environment, yet it must be 
such as to satisfy all the longings, and 
give scope for all the activities of a per- 
fected humanity’ (Mayor, ed. p. 207. 
See also his most interesting and sug- 
gestive note: ‘‘ Answer to the objection 
that nochange is possible in the material 
universe’’; and with whole passage, vv. 
5-7, cf. Ruskin, Sesame and Lilies, p. 
24. 

Wy. 8-10. A further argument to ex- 
plain the apparent delay. ‘One thing 
beloved, you must not forget. The sense 
of the duration of time in the Divine 
Mind is not the same as in the human. 
One day is the same to God asa thousand 
years, and a thousand years as one day. 
God must not be judged as slack by human 
standards, in the fulfilment of His pro- 
mise. He is better than the promise. 
He is long-suffering to usward, not 
willing that some should perish, but 
that all should come to repentance. We 
know not when His long-suffering will be 
exhausted. The day of the Lord will 


come as a thief. Then the heavens will 
pass away with hurtling noise, and the 
elements being burned, shall pass away, 
and the earth and the works of men con- 
tained in it, will be made manifest.” 

Ver. 8. pia ἡμέρα, κιτιλ. Cf. Ps. 
xl. 4. The literal application of this 
statement to the story of creation, em- 
ployed by patristic writers, in which one 
day is interpreted as rooo years, and 
therefore the creation ‘in six days really 
means 6000 years, is of course absurd. 
On the other hand, it can scarcely be 
said that the writer of 2 Peter has attained 
to the conception that the category of 
time does not exist for the Divine Mind. 
Rather the meaning is that infinite com- 
passion overrides in the Divine Mind all 
finite reckoning. Cf. Barnabas, 15, Jus- 
tin, Dialogue, 81. 

Ver. 9. ov βραδύνει. .. ἡγοῦνται. 
The idea that is combated is that God 
has made a promise and has not kept it, 
He is, however, better than His promise. 
The additional element of His paxpo@v- 
μία is brought into play. God is greater 
than men’s conception of Him, especially 
if theirs is a mechanical view of the uni- 
verse.—&s τινες βραδύτητα ἡγοῦνται. 
As nowhere else in the Epistle, here the 
writer of 2 Peter enables us to view the 
summit of the Christian Faith, and to 
rise to a magnificent conception of God. 
μὴ βουλόμενός, κιτιλ. Delay does not 
spring from an unwillingness or impot- 
ence to perform. His will is not even 
that “some’”’ should perish, though that 
is regarded by the writer as inevitable. 
Are we to see here opposition in the 
writer’s mind to the purely logical inter- 
pretation of the Pauline teaching on 
Predestination? Some will perish, but 
itis not His Will. His Will is that all 
should come to repentance. The good- 
ness of God should lead to repentance. 

Ver. 10. ἡμέρα Kuptov. No distinc- 
tion is made between the Day of the 
Lord, and the Coming of Christ. This is 
remarkable, as excluding any idea of mil- 


y-ul. 


΄ 3 e ς > ‘ 
κλέπτης, ἐν ἡ Ol οὐρανοὶ 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ B 


145 


ῥοιζηδὸν © παρελεύσονται, στοιχεῖα δὲ g John xix. 


31, Rev. 


, , ἈΝ ~ A a > 5 ~ ” c 67 1 
καυσούμενα λυθήσεται, καὶ γῆ καὶ τὰ ἐν αὐτῇ Epya εὑρεθήσεται. Rana F 


a ς Δ c ~ 
II. Τούτων οὖν» πάντων λυομένων ποταποὺς Set ὑπάρχειν ὑμᾶς 


Xen. 
Anab. 1, 7, 17. 


1 evpeOnoerat SBKP, syrP; ουχ ευρεθησεται sah. ; κατακαησεται AL, syrh, Ti. ; 
καυθησεται vel.; κατακαυθησονται al.; αφανισθησονται C; om. kat yn... evpe- 


θησεται vulg.; om. ευρεθησεται spec. 


Both Nestle and Mayor agree in suggesting 


the passive of a compound of pew (καταρυησεται or διαρρυησεται. I am indebted 
to Professor J. H. Moulton for the information that the late Henry Bradshaw, of 


Cambridge, suggested the reading epya apya ευρεθησεται. 


As against this, and 


in favour of the text as it stands, we have 2 Clem. xvi. 3, which seems to be a 


paraphrase of tkis passage. 


Kal πᾶσα ἡ γῆ ὡς μόλυβδος ἐπὶ πυρὶ τηκόμενος, Kal 


τότε φανήσεται τὰ κρύφια καὶ φανερὰ ἔργα τῶν ἀνθρώπων. 


lenarian teaching, which speedily made 
its appearance in the Early Church. ὡς 
κλέπτης, cf. I Thess. v. 2, Matt. xxiv. 
43, Luke xii. 39, Apoc. iii. 3, xvi. 15. 
That day will surprise those who are 
clinging to the idea that no change is 
possible. ῥοιζηδὸν, onomatopoetic, ex- 
pressing the sound produced by rapid 
motion through the air, ¢.g., flight of a 
bird, or an arrow. It is also used of the 
sound of a shepherd’s pipe. No doubt 
the sound of afierce flame is meant. 
“Tt is used of thunder in Luc. Fup. 
Trag. 1; of the music of the spheres in 
Iamblich, Vit. Pyth. c. 15; Oecumenius 
says the word is especially used of the 
noise caused by a devouring flame” 
(Mayor, ed. p. 157). στοιχεῖα. Spitta 
interprets or. as being the spirits that 
preside over the various parts of nature. 
But the situation of or. between γῆ 
and ovpavot makes it practically cer- 
tain that the heavenly bodies are meant. 
The universe consists of οὐρανοὶ, στοι- 
xeta and γῆ. οὐρανοὶ is the vault of 
heaven, ‘‘ the skies”. στ. would therefore 
mean sun, moon and stars. Cf. Justin. 
Afol. ii. 5, Trypho. 23. Cf. Isa. xxxiv. 4, 
Joel ii. 30, 31, Matt. xxiv. 29, Apoc. vi. 12- 
14 in illustration of the Jewish belief that 
the stars will share in the final destruc- 
tion of the Last Day. καυσούμενα. A 
medical term, used of the heat of fever 
(katoos). This is the only known use 
of the word applied to inanimate objects. 
Whether the writer of 2 Peter has here 
indulged a fondness for unusual words, 
or whether kavodopat was ever used in 
other than a medical sense in the Κοινὴ, 
it is impossible as yet to say. In any 
case it denotes a violent consuming heat. 
εὑρεθήσεται. The only alternative read- 
ing that is worthy of notice in con- 
nexion with this difficult passage is kata- 
καήσεται, but one would expect a word 


expressing dissolution, like παρελεύσον- 
ται, or λυθήσεται. εὑρεθήσεται is found 
in an absolute sense in Clement, Cor. ix. 
3 (of Enoch) οὐχ εὑρέθη αὐτοῦ θάνα- 
τος, ‘‘ his death was not brought to light”. 
In 2 Clem. xvi. (see textual note) φανήσ- 
erat is the paraphrase of εὑρεθήσεται (cf. 
Introd. pp. go f.). 

Vv. 11-16. The ethical value of the 
Parousia expectation. ‘‘Seeing then 
that all these things are to be dissolved, 
how great an effect it ought to exercise 
on our whole moral and religious life, as 
we look forward to and hasten the com- 
ing of the day of God. The skies shall 
be set on fire and dissolved, and the ele- 
ments shall melt with fiercest heat, but 
we look for new skies and a new earth 
according to His promise, in which 
righteousness shall finda home. Where- 
fore, beloved, with such expectations, 
endeavour to be found in peace, spotless 
and blameless. Do not reckon the long- 
suffering of our Lord as an opportunity 
for licence, but as a means of salvation, 
as our beloved brother Paul wrote you in 
the wisdom granted to him. He indeed 
spoke in all his letters of these things, in 
which there are some things hard to be 
understood, which ignorant and unstable 
persons wrest, as they do the other 
Scriptures, to their own destruction.” 

Ver. τι. λυομένων. Present used for 
a future. Mayor translates ‘are in pro- 
cess of dissolution,” as though the prin- 
ciple of φθορά were already at work ; but 
this is a conception foreign to the mind 
of the writer, who uses it only ina moral 
significance. Nature is ‘‘reserved”’ 
(θησαυρίζεσθαι) for destruction. Dis- 
solution is the goal in sight. ποταπούς. 
‘* What sort of men.” A later form of 


ποδαπός. ὑπάρχειν implies not merely 
existence, but existential character. 
ἀναστροφαῖς Kal εὐσεβείαις. The use- 


ΠΕΤΡΟΥ B 


11 


3 πὸ > = ‘ > , a ‘ 
ἐν ἅγιαις ἀναστροφαιῖς καὶ εὐσεβείαις, 12. προσδοκῶντας καὶ 


, Ἢ , fol ~ ~ ε , rm. 5 Ν 
σπεύδοντας τὴν παρουσιᾶν τῆς τοῦ Θεοῦ Ἄμέερᾶς, δι nv ουρανοι 


πυρούμενοι λυθήσονται καὶ στοιχεῖα καυσούμενα τήκεται. 


13. 


‘ Ν 3 Ν Ν = ἈΝ x ἈΝ 3 , 3 A 
KQLVOUS δὲ oupavous και yu καινὴν κατὰ TO ἐπάγγελμα αὐτου 


προσδοκῶμεν, ἐν οἷς δικαιοσύνη κατοικεῖ. 


14. Διό, ἀγαπητοί, 


ἢ 2 Οογ. χί!. ταῦτα προσδοκῶντες σπουδάσατε ἄσπιλοι καὶ ἀμώμητοι * αὐτῷ 


20. 


εὑρεθῆναι ἐν εἰρήνῃ, 15. καὶ τὴν τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν μακροθυμίαν 


σωτηρίαν ἡγεῖσθε, καθὼς καὶ ὃ ἀγαπητὸς ἡμῶν ἀδελφὸς Παῦλος 
κατὰ τὴν δοθεῖσαν αὐτῷ σοφίαν ἔγραψεν ὑμῖν, 16. ὡς καὶ ἐν πάσαις ὦ 


ἱπασαις ταις ΜΚ ΚΙ,Ρ, ΤΙ. ; om. 


-of the plural in cases of abstract nouns is 
peculiar to the writerandto1 Peter. He 
emphasises once more the close connexion 
between morality and religion. 

Ver. 12. σπεύδοντας. Either (τ) 
“earnestly desiring,’ cf. Isa. xvi. 5, 
σπεύδων δικαιοσύνην, or (2) preferably, 
“hastening the coming’. ‘“‘ The Church 
may be said to bring the day nearer 
when it prays, ‘Thy kingdom come’ ” 
(Bigg). The writer is here referring to 
the Jewish idea that the sins of men 
prevented Messiah from appearing. ‘‘ Si 
Judaei poenitentiam facerent una die, 
statim veniret Messias, filius David.’ 

The words are capable of a still more 
spiritual meaning, which, however, is 
rather beyond the consciousness of this 
writer. The kingdom of God is ‘‘ with- 
in’’ us, and Christians may be said to 
hasten this coming by holiness of life. 
Christian conduct is itself both a rebuke 
to vice and a realisation of the presence 
of Christ in the hearts of His disciples. 

τήκεται. Again present for future. 
The phrases in this verse are repeated 
from ver. 10 in order to introduce the more 
impressively the idea in ver. 13. 

Ver. 13. καινοὺς δὲ οὐρανοὺς ... 
προσδοκῶμεν. Cf. Isa. Ixv. 17. ἔσται 
γὰρ ὁ οὐρανὸς καινὸς καὶ ἣ γῆ καινή. 
Enoch xei. 16. See note on’ ver. 7: 

οὐρανός might appropriately be trans- 
lated “sky”. ἐν οἷς δικαιοσύνη κατοι- 
ket; “wherein righteousness dwells,” 
or ‘thas its home”. In the word there 
is both the sense of permanence and of 
persuasive influence. Both in the hearts 
of men, and the new environment, there 
will be nothing that militates against 
righteousness. The Parousia is both 
judgment on the wicked and triumph for 
the kingdom. Cf. v. 7. 

Ver. 14. ἄσπιλοι kal ἀμώμητοι αὐτῷ. 
αὐτῷ is dative = “in relation to Him,” 
or ‘‘in His sight”. Cf. Rom. vii. τὸ: 
εὑρέθη μοι ἡ ἐντολὴ 7 εἰς ζωὴν αὕτη 


ταις ABC, Treg., WH, Weiss. 


εἰς θάνατον; Ephes. i. 4, εἶναι ἀμώμους 
κατενώπιον αὐτοῦ. For ἄσπιλοι καὶ 
ἀμώμητοι, cf. note ON ν. 13. ἀμώμητος 
occursin Epistle of Aristeas (ed. Wend- 
land), with reference to sacrificial victims. 
ἐν εἰρήνῃ. Peace and righteousness are 
one. Cf. Ps. Ixxxv. 10. The ‘“ well- 
doers ’’ will be able to meet the Parousia 
with calm expectation. 

Ver. 15. καὶ τὴν τοῦ Kuplov... 
ἡγεῖσθε. Cf. ν. 9. The Divine long- 
suffering is capable of interpretation as 
ἐς slackness,”’ or as opportunity for license 
instead of as σωτηρίαν, an opportunity 
for repentance. καθὼς καὶ 6 ἀγαπητὸς 
. . +» ἔγραψεν ὑμῖν. The interpretation 
here largely depends oh (1) whether the 
reference of καθὼς is confined to the idea 
in the first clause of the verse, or (2) is 
to be extended to include ἄσπιλοι καὶ 
ἀμώμητοι . .. εἰρήνῃ in ver. 14, or (3) 
is still further extended to include the 
whole treatment of moral disorder aris- 
ing from delayed Parousia. In the case 
of (1) .Romans would be the most ap- 
propriate among the known canonical 
epistles. In that epistle the idea of 
God’s long-suffering is most prominent 
(cf. ii. 4, i811. 255/26, 1x. 22,23; Χὶ: 25. 55)» 
(2) Almost any of St. Paul’s epistles 
might be meant. (3) If the question 
of moral disorder arising from difficulties 
about the παρουσία is placed in the 
foreground, ‘‘none of the existing Pau- 
line Epistles can be in question except 
1 Corinthians (in this Church there were 
very similar extravagances, and the 
Resurrection was by some denied) and 
Thessalonians” (Bigg). A decision on 
this point involves the discussion on the 
destination of the epistle, for which see 
Introduction, pp. 205 f. (cf. Zahn., Introd. 
ii., pp. 211-2). ὁ ἀγαπητὸς . . . Παῦλος 
need not imply that Paul wasalive. κατὰ 
τὴν δοθεῖσαν αὐτῷ σοφίαν. Cf. τ Cor. 
iii. το, Gal. ii. g, 1 Cor. iii, 66, Col. i. 28. 

Ver. 16. ὡς καὶ ἐν πάσαις ταῖς 


rte « 


1t—tL/. 


HEFPOY iB 


147 


ex > A A > > ἊΝ \ , > 2 > \ ὃ , , 
ταῖς ἐπιστολαῖς λαλῶν ἐν αὐταῖς περὶ τούτων, ἐν αἷς ἐστὶν δυσνόητά 


Ε a a ‘ 
τινα, ἃ οἱ ἀμαθεῖς καὶ ἀστήρικτοι στρεβλοῦσιν ὡς Kal Tas λοιπὰς 


γραφὰς πρὸς τὴν ἰδίαν ἱ αὐτῶν ἀπώλειαν. 


i Acts ii. 8, 
Tit. 1. 12, 


17. Ὑμεῖς οὖν, ἀγαπητοί, προγινώσκοντες φυλάσσεσθε iva μὴ τῇ 


ἐπιστολαῖς. This statement implies 
neither the inclusion of all the epistles 
that have come down to us, nor the 
formation of acanon. It is much more 
natural to take it as referring to a collec- 
tion of letters made not long after Paul’s 
death, and read in the churches. The 
term 6 ἀγαπητὸς ἡμῶν ἀδελφὸς in ver. 
15 would seem to refer to one whose 
memory is still quite fresh in the hearts 
of the readers. λαλῶν ἐν αὐταῖς περὶ 
τούτων : “where he touches on these 
subjects” (Mayor). περὶ τούτων indi- 
cates a widening of the reference to in- 
clude Paul’s treatment of the whole 
question of the Second Coming. The 
mention of Paul’s name here implies a 
desire on the part of the writer to show 
that on this point the Pauline and Petrine 
teaching are atone. The false teachers 
founded their Antinomian doctrine on 
Paul’s teaching about the Grace of God. 
ἐν ais, «.t.A. This clearly involves 
that a collection of letters is meant. 
δυσνόητά τινα. ‘What are the δυσν- 
énra referred to? ‘“ ProbablyiSt. Paul’s 
doctrine of God’s free grace (Rom. iii. 
5-8), with his apparent disparagement of 
the law in Rom. iii. 20-28, iv. 15, v. 20, 
vi. 4, vii. 4-11; his teaching with regard 
to the πνευματικοὶ, τ Cor. i. 15 ; with re- 
gard to the strong, whom he seems to 
just fy in their neglect of the rule made 
at the Apostolic Council, as to εἰδωλόθυτα 
(Acts xv. 29; Rom. 14; 1 Cor. vill., x. 
25); as regards the Resurrection in bap- 
tism (Rom. vi. 3-11; Col. iii. 1; 1 Cor. 
xv. 12); perhaps as regards predestination 
(Rom. ix. 11-21), and the Parousia (2 
Th. 11.) (Mayor). οἱ ἀμαθεῖς καὶ ἀστή- 
ρικτοι. ἀμαθής is not used elsewhere in 
the N.T. It signifies not so much “un- 
learned”’ as “uneducated’’; a mind un- 
trained and undisciplined in habits of 
thought, lacking in the moral qualities 
of a balanced judgment. ἀστήρικτοι 
refers more to conduct, those whose 
habits are not fully trained and estab- 
lished. The reference of ap. καὶ dornp. 
is of course not to the Libertines, but 
to a class among the readers. In ver. 
17 στηριγμός is used of the readers, in 
distinction to the False Teachers, who are 
called ἀθέσμων. στρεβλοῦσιν: of per- 
sons, ‘to torture,” of things, “το wrest ”’ 
or “twist ᾽", 


ὡς kal Tas λοιπὰς γραφάς. (τὴ There 
has been much discussion among com- 
mentators as to the meaning of γραφάς. 
Spitta takes γραφάς in sense of ‘ writ- 
ings,”’ and concludes that these were by 
companions of the Apostle Paul; but 
this is a very unusual sense of γραφή 
unless the name of an author is given. 
Mayor and others interpret as the O.T. 
Scriptures ; while some who are prepared 
to assign a late date in the second cen- 
tury to the epistle, think that both Old 
and New Testament Scriptures are 
meant. On every ground the hypothesis 
of γραφάς = O.T. Scriptures is to be pre- 
ferred. (2) The difficulty in connexion 
with the meaning of γραφάς is largely 
occasioned by the phrase τὰς λοιπὰς yp. 
Does this mean that the Epistles of St. 
Paul are regarded as Scripture? At- 
tempts have been made (e.g., by Dr. 
Bigg) to cite classical and other parallels 
that would justify the sense for tas 
λοιπὰς, “the Scriptures as well’. In 
these, certain idiomatic uses of ἄλλος 
and other words are referred to, but no 
real parallel to this sense of λοιπός can 
be found, and the connexion implied in 
λοιπός is closer than ἄλλος. The result 
of the whole discussion is practically to 
compel us to take τὰς λοιπὰς γραφάς in 
the obvious sense ‘‘ the rest of the Scrip- 
tures,’ and we cannot escape the con- 
clusion that the Epistles of Paul are 
classed with these. The intention of the 
author of 2 Peter seems to be to regard 
the Pauline Epistles, or those of them 
that he knew, as γραφαὶ, because they 
were read in the churches along with the 
lessons from the O.T. 

Viva £7,. 18. Final exhortation. 
“Having then, brethren, been fore- 
warned, be on your guard lest you fall 
from your own foundation, carried away 
by the error of lawless men. Grow in 
the grace and knowledge of Our Lord 
and Saviour Jesus Christ. To Him 
be glory both now and in the day of 
eternity.” 

Ver. 17. This verse gathers up various 
thoughts that appear elsewhere in the 
epistle. Προγινώσκοντες repeats ταῦτα 
πρῶτον γινώσκοντες Of i. 20, iii. τὶ 
ἀθέσμων occurs ii. 7; πλάνη ii. 18. 
συναπαχθέντες (cf. Galat. ii. 13), ‘‘car- 
tied away”. ἀθέσμων, see note ii. 7. 


148 


TETPOY B 


111: 18: 


k Gal. ii. 13. τῶν ἀθέσμων πλάνῃ * συναπαχθέντες ἐκπέσητε τοῦ ἰδίου στηριγμοῦ, 


18. αὐξάνετε δὲ ἐν χάριτι καὶ γνώσει τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν καὶ σωτῆρος 


3 lol 


QUTG) 


᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ. δ 
στηριγμοῦ, ‘ steadfastness”; perhaps 
“foundation ”’ is better, although in this 
sense we would expect στήριγμα. There 
is, however, a tendency in N.T. to con- 
fuse words in -pa -pos. Cf. κύλισμα 
(2 Pet. 11. 22). ἅρπαγμός (Phil. ii. 6). 
The foundation is the χάρις and γνῶσις of 
v. 18. ἰδίου is in emphatic contrast to 
the untrustworthy basis of the Libertine 
teaching. 

Ver. 18. ἐν χάριτι καὶ γνώσει τοῦ 
Κυρίου, κιτλ. The genitive is to be 
taken with both words. γνῶσις here 
means ‘spiritual instruction,’ a know- 
ledge that has its source in Christ Him- 
self, as distinct from ἐπίγνωσις, which is 
personal communion with Christ (see 
note i. 5). γνῶσις is the privilege of the 


ce Ν A A > ε , 3A 
ἡ δόξα καὶ νῦν καὶ εἰς ἡμέραν αἰῶνος. 


“friend’’ of Christ. Cf. John vii. 17, 
xv. 15. αὐτῷ. Note that the doxology 
is addressed to Christ, and, therefore, 
κυρίου ἡμῶν. also refers to Him. eis 
ἡμέραν αἰῶνος: “in the day of eter- 
nity’. The meanings of eis and ἐν 
in later Greek are somewhat interchang- 
able (cf. Moulton, Proleg. 234 f.). hp. 
ai@vos is a very rare phrase not found 
elsewhere in N.T. It is found in Sir. 
xviii. 10, where the phrase is ἐν ἡμέρᾳ 
αἰῶνος. The more usual expression is 
εἰς TOUS αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων. “εἰς τοὺς 
αἰῶνας becomes so immediately the rul- 
ing phrase that this Petrine doxology 
cannot have been written after liturgical 
expressions had become in any degree 
stereotyped” (Bigg). 


THE EPISTLES 


ST. JOHN 


VOL. V. IO 





INTRODUCTION. 


Tue First EPISTLE. 


Tue first Epistle differs from all the other N.T. Epistles save the 
Epistle to the Hebrews in this, that it is anonymous. The author, 
however, claims to have been an eye-witness of the Word of Life 
(i. 1-3) and speaks throughout in a tone of apostolic authority, and 
there is abundance of primitive and credible testimony that he was 
St. John, ‘the disciple whom Jesus loved,” and the last survivor of 
the Apostle-company. 

1. The MSS. Titles—AB “\wdvou (-άννου) a: δὴ ᾿Ιωάννου ἐπιστολὴ 
a: L ἐπιστολὴ καθολικὴ τοῦ ἁγίου ἀποστόλου Ἰωάννου : P “lwdvvou τοῦ 
εὐαγγελιστοῦ καὶ ἀποσ(τόλου ἐπιστολὴ) a. Two later MSS. have inter- 
esting titles—13 ἐπιστολὴ a Ἰωάννου - εὐαγγελικὴ θεολογία περὶ xu: f 
βροντῆς υἱὸς Ἰωάννης τάδε χριστιανοῖσιν.ἢ 

2. Patristic Evidence.—Polycarp. ad Philipp. vili.: πᾶς γὰρ ὃς ἂν 
μὴ ὁμολογῇ Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν ἐν σαρκὶ ἐληλυθέναι, ἀντίχριστός ἐστιν----ἃ mani- 
fest echo of 1 John iv. 2,3. This proves the early date of our Epistle 
and the esteem in which it was held, and if it does not attest the 
Johannine authorship, it at least suggests it. Polycarp had known 
several of the Apostles and of those who had seen the Lord; he had 
been a disciple of St. John and had been ordained by him bishop of 
Smyrna; and he was the leading ecclesiastic in the whole of Asia. 
Cf. der. Script. Eccies.; Iren. 111: iii. 4. 

Eusebius (H. E. iii. 39) says that Papias, whom Irenzeus had 
called “a hearer of John and a comrade of Polycarp, an ancient man 


1St. Augustine’s discourses on the First Epistle are entitled ‘‘ Ten Treatises on 
the Epistle of John to the Parthians (In Efistolam ¥oannis ad Parthos Tractatus 
Decem),” and he elsewhere quotes from the Epistle under this strange title (Quest. 
Ev. ii. 39). Probably the Epistle was entitled in some MS. ᾿Ιωάννου τοῦ παρθένου, 
as the Apocalypse is entitled in 30 αποκαλυψ. του αγιου evSofotatov αποστολου 
και ευαγγελιστου παρθενου nyamnpevov επιστηθιου twavvov Beodoyov, and TOY- 
NAPOENOY was mistaken tor MPOZMAPOOY. The Latin frag. of Clem. Alex.’s 
exposition of the Second Epistle begins: ‘‘ Secunda Joannis epistola que ad virgines 
scripta,” where ‘“‘ Joannis ad virgines”’ probably represents Ἰωάννου τοῦ παρθένου. 


152 ᾿ INTRODUCTION 


(Ἰωάννου μὲν ἀκουστὴς Πολυκάρπου δὲ ἑταῖρος γεγονὼς, ἀρχαῖος avnp),” 
“used testimonies from the first (former) epistle of John (κέχρηται δ᾽ 
ὁ αὐτὸς μαρτυρίαις ἀπὸ τῆς ᾿Ιωάννου προτέρας ἐπιστολῆς) . προτέρας is 
merely a grammatical inaccuracy, as conversely πρῶτος for πρότερος 
in Matt..xxi..36:; Acts i. 1; 1 Cor. xiv. 99: Heb, x 9; Rev. xxi; 
Cf. Eus. H. E. iii. 24; 4 προτέρα τῶν ἐπιστολῶν... at λοιπαὶ δύο. 

Irenzeus, a disciple of Polycarp! and bishop of Lyons, quotes 1 
John ii. 18, 19, 21, 22, iv. 1, 3, v. 1, and says expressly that he is. 
quoting from the Epistle of St. John.? 

The Muratorian Canon (about a.p. 170) includes our epistle and 
ascribes it to St. John: “ Quid ergo mirum si Johannes tam constanter 
singula etiam in epistulis suis proferat, dicens in semetipso: Que 
vidimus oculis nostris, et auribus audivimus, et manus nortre pal- 
paverunt, hac scripsimus?” Cf. 1 John i. 1.8 

These testimonies are primitive, and there is no need to adduce 
in addition the later and abundant testimonies of Clement of Alex- 
andria, Tertullian, Origen, Jerome, Augustine, Athanasius. 

With no less unanimity and emphasis does ancient tradition. 
ascribe the Fourth Gospel to St. John, and it hardly admits of 
reasonable doubt that the Gospel and the Epistle are from the one 
pen. They agree in style, language, and thought. They have the 
same Hebraistic style, abounding in parallelism (e.g. cf. 1 John ii. 
10, 11 with John iii. 18, 20, 21) and parataxis (the co-ordinating καί is. 
the favourite conjunction). Their style is identical, and it is unique 
in the N.T. They have, moreover, common phrases and expressions 
Cf. Ep. i. 1, 2 with Gosp. i. 1, 2, 4, 14; Ep. i. 4 with Gosp. xv. 11, 
xvi. 24; Ep. ii. 1 with Gosp. xiv. 16, 26, xv. 26, xvi. 7; Ep. 11. 8 with 
Gosp. xiii. 34, xv. 10,12; Ep. ii. 11 with Gosp. xii. 35; Ep. iii. 8, 15 
with Gosp. viii. 44; Ep. iti. 11, 16 with Gosp. xv. 12,13; Ep. iii. 12 
with Gosp. vii. 7; Ep. iii. 18 with Gosp. xv. 18, 19; Ep. iii. 14 with 
Gosp. v. 24; Ep. iv. 6 with Gosp. viii. 47; Ep. iv. 12 with Gosp. i. 14; 
Ep. iv. 14 with Gosp. iii. 17; Ep. v. 3 with Gosp. xiv. 15, 21; Ep. v. 
6-8 with Gosp. xix. 34,35; Ep. v. 9 with Gosp. v. 32, 34, 36, viii. 17, 
18; Ep. v. 10 with Gosp. ili. 33; Ep. v. 12 with Gosp. iii. 15, 36; 
Ep. v. 13 with Gosp. xx. 31; Ep. v. 14 with Gosp. xiv. 13, 14, xvi. 23; 
Ep. v. 20 with Gosp. xvii. 3. Then they have in common certain 
fundamental conceptions which are thus defined and enumerated by 
Dr. H. J. Holtzmann: “the Son of God in the Flesh, the Life, which. 
has its source in Him and is identical with Him, the Being in Him, 
the Abiding in God, the Love of God actualised in the Sending of 


4 Jer. Script. Eccles. 2 Tren, III. xviii. 5, 8. 
>The Mur. Can, is given in Routh’s Relig. Sacr., i. pp. 394 seq. 


INTRODUCTION 153 


the Son, the resultant Commandment of Brotherly Love, the Walking 
in the Light, the Begetting of God, the Overcoming of the World, 
etc.; the antitheses of Life and Death, Light and Darkness, Love and 
Hate, Truth and Lying, Rather and World, God and Devil, Children 
of God and Children of the εν}. Thus inextricably are the two 
works intertwined. ‘Our Epistle,” says Rothe, ‘has throughout as 
its presupposition the peculiar conception of the person and history 
of the Redeemer, in general the peculiar conception of Christianity, 
which prevails in the Gospel. Consequently, if the Fourth Gospel is 
a work of the Apostle John, our Epistle also belongs as indubitably to 
him; as in the contrary case our Epistle could be no composition of 
the Apostle John.” 

The common authorship has nevertheless been called in question 
on the ground of certain alleged divergences which, says Schmiedel, 
“are explained much more easily on the assumption that the two 
writings come from different writers though belonging to one and the 
same school of thought.” The divergences are (1) linguistic, and (2) 
doctrinal.} 

(1) The words ἀγγελία, ἐπαγγελία, διάνοια, παρουσία, ἐλπίς, ἀνομία 
and others occur in the Epistle and not in the Gospel. But what 
then? A writer need not exhaust his entire vocabulary in a single 
writing: that would argue extreme barrenness of mind. Does it 
follow that the Third Gospel and the Book of Acts are by different 
authors because ἐλπίς never occurs in the former and eight times in 
the latter, or that the Epistle to the Romans is not St. Paul’s because 
ἱλαστήριον occurs in it and in no other of his Epistles? The only 
reasonable inference from the occurrence of words in the Epistle 
which are absent from the Gospel is that the former is not an imita- 
tion of the latter. 

(2) The following instances of doctrinal divergence are adduced : 
(2) ἱλασμός in Ep. 11. 2, iv. 10 and nowhere else in the N.T.; whereas, 
says Martineau, “the gospel knows nothing of an atoning or pro- 
pitiatory efficacy in the blood of Christ”’. It is true that the word is 
not found in the Gospel, but the idea is. Cf. i. 29, x. 11, 15, xi. 49, 
52. (bd) χρῖσμα (Ep. 11. 20, 27) is another ἅπαξ λεγόμενον. The very 
idea, however, is found in the Gospel (xiv. 26, xvi. 13). (2) The 
Gospel is more spiritual in its eschatology, representing the Judgment 
not as future but as present (iii. 18) and the Coming of Christ as 
happening in the experience of each believer (xiv. 3); whereas the 

1See Holtzmann’s Einl, in das N.T., and his elaborate discussion: Das Proél. 


des erst. johann. Br. in sein. Verhalt. zum Ev. in Fahrb. f. prot. Theol. (1881-82) ; 
Martineau’s Seat of Auth., p. 509; Schmiedel in Encycl. Bibl., vol. ii., cols. 2556-7. 


154 INTRODUCTION 


Epistle represents the παρουσία (ii. 28) as “a visible individual occur- 
rence” on a particular day (iv. 17). This is simply erroneous. The 
Gospel also speaks of a final and universal Judgment (v. 29), ‘the 
last day” (vi. 39, 40, 44,54; xi. 24), and a personal Coming of Christ 
(xxi. 22, 23).1 (4) The Παράκλητος is the Holy Spirit in the Gospel, 
Jesus in the Epistle. Here, however, there is no divergence. The 
doctrine of the Epistle explains the Gospel’s ἄλλον Παράκλητον (Σίν. 
16). See commentary on ii. 1. 

It is beyond reasonable doubt that the Epistle and the Gospel are 
from the same pen. ‘The identity of authorship in the two books,”’ 
says Lightfoot,? ‘‘though not undisputed, is accepted with such a 
degree of unanimity that it may be placed in the category of acknow- 
ledged facts.’”’ And they have a very intimate connection. This is 
abundantly apparent from internal evidence. The Epistle opens with 
a reference to the Gospel-narrative, and there is an unmistakable 
relation between 1 John v. 13 and John xx. 31 (see commentary). 
Indeed the Epistle throughout has the Gospel as its background and 
is hardly intelligible without it. It is, in the language of Lightfoot,% 
“ἃ devotional and moral application of the main ideas which are 
evolved historically in the sayings and doings of Christ recorded in 
the Gospel”. And it is significant that the Muratorian Canon men- 
tions the First Epistle in connection with the Gospel, and the Second 
and Third Epistles after an interval in their natural place among the 
other Epistles of the N.T. 

The precise connection between them is nowhere indicated, but 
it appears from a consideration of the historical situation. The 
fall of Jerusalem in a.p. 70 dispersed the Church, and a colony of 
disciples found a home in Asia Minor. It was a considerable and 
increasingly influential community, including, in the phrase of Poly- 
crates of Ephesus, “great luminaries (μεγάλα στοιχεῖα) ’—not only 
the Apostles Philip and Andrew® but, according to abundant and 
trustworthy tradition, St. John. The latter fixed his residence at 
Ephesus, where there was a church founded by St. Paul.’ It was 
the proudest boast of Ephesus that she was ‘‘the Temple-sweeper 
(νεωκόρος) of Artemis” (Acts xix. 35), and the Temple which she had 
reared for her goddess was one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient 

1John xxi. is an addition to the Gospel. but it is by the same hand, ‘‘a post- 
script from the same pen as the rest’ (Renan). 

2 Ess. on Sup. Rel., pp. 186 f. 3 Tbid., p. 188. 

4Eus. H. E. iti. 31, v. 24. 5 Mur. Can. 

δ θη the credibility of this tradition see Drummond, The Char. and Auth. of the 


Fourth Gospel, pp. 814 ff. 
TIren. III. iii. 4. 


INTRODUCTION 5% 


world; and in that historic and brilliant city St. John exercised his 
ministry to the end of his long life, which lasted until the reign of 
Trajan (A.D. 98-117).} 

It was an active and gracious ministry. It had Ephesus for its 
headquarters, but it comprehended a wide area. St. John took over- 
sight of all the Christian communities in the surrounding country— 
such as the churches of Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, 
them by letters and visitations. ‘‘ He would go away when invited,’ 
says Clement of Alexandria,? ‘to the neighbouring districts of the 
Sentiles, here to appoint bishops, there to form new churches, and 
there to put into the office of the ministry some one of those that 
were indicated by the Spirit.”” And Clement proceeds to relate an 
interesting story, μῦθον οὐ μῦθον. The Apostle once visited a neigh- 
bouring city—Smyrna, according to the Alexandrian Chronicle—and 
saw there a lad of stalwart form, charming face, and ardent spirit. 
“Ἱ deposit this lad in thy keeping,” he said to the bishop, “with all 
earnestness, taking the Church and Christ to witness.” The bishop 
accepted the trust and, when St. John returned to Ephesus, took the 
lad home, nurtured him, and finally baptised him. Then, thinking 
he had done enough, he let him alone, and the lad fell into evil 
company, committed a crime, and, fleeing to the mountains, became 
the captain of a band of brigands. By and by St. John revisited that 
city, and after settling the business which had brought him, he said: 
** Now then, bishop, restore us the deposit which the Saviour and | 
entrusted to thee”. The bishop was thunderstruck, supposing that 
he was being accused of some pecuniary intromission. “It is the 
lad that I am requiring,” explained St. John, ‘‘and the soul of the 
brother.” The bishop groaned and wept: “He is dead!” “How? 
When? And whatdeath?” ‘He is dead to God,” said the bishop, 
and told the story. The Apostle rent his robe and with a loud cry 
smote his head. ‘A fine guardian of the brother’s soul did I leave 
in thee! Let me have a horse forthwith and some one to show me 
the way.” And he rode off and found the lost youth, and by tender 
entreaties won him to penitence and brought him back to the 
Church. 

Such was the ministry of St. John at Ephesus, and it was far on 
in the course of it that he wrote his Gospel, “ having employed all 
the time an unwritten message’”’.* He wrote it, says the Muratorian 
Canon, “ δὲ the exhortation of his fellow-disciples and bishops,” 1.e., 
his own congregation at Ephesus and his colleagues in the neigh- 


1fren. III. iii. 4. 2 De Div. Serv. 42. 3 Eus. H. E. iii. 24. 


156 INTRODUCTION 


bouring churches within the circuit of his supervision. It was 
intended for the instruction and edification of the Christians all over 
that extensive area. And the Epistle is, in the phrase of Lightfoot, 
a “commendatory postscript’? to the Gospel. This explains the 
circumstance of its having neither address nor signature. It was 
not sent to a particular community, and since it was an appendix to 
the Gospel, it had no need to be inscribed with the author’s name. 

The aim of the Epistle is twofold—polemical and religious. 
Irenzeus says! that ‘“‘John the disciple of the Lord desired by the 
declaration of his Gospel to remove the error which had been sown 
among men by Cerinthus and, much earlier, by those who are called 
Nicolaitans”’. And this is borne out by the companion Epistle. It 
is against these two heresies that the polemic of the latter is directed. 

1. It is said that the Nicolaitans were the followers of Nicolas, 
one of the seven deacons (Acts vi. 5),? and this strange story is told 
of him by Clement of Alexandria*: ‘‘ He had, they say, a beautiful 
wife, and after the Ascension of the Saviour, being taunted by the 
Apostles with jealousy, he brought the woman forward and gave who 
would permission to marry her. This, they say, is in accordance 
with that expression of his: ‘ We must abuse the flesh’. And indeed 
the adherents of his sect follow up the incident and the saying abso- 
lutely and unquestioningly and commit fornication without restraint’. 
Clement proceeds to attest the moral purity of Nicolas and explain 
his action as an inculcation of ascetic self-restraint, but certainly the 
sect which bore his name was given over to licentiousness. Clement 
says elsewhere‘ that they were “dissolute as he-goats,” and others 
bear like testimony. They were Antinomians, disowning moral 
obligation, nullam differentiam esse docentes in mechando et idolothy- 
ton edere;® herein being forerunners of the Gnostics and justifying 
Tertullian’s classification of them with the Cainites.’ This heresy 
was rampant among the churches of Asia Minor in St. John’s day 
(cf. Rev. ii. 6, 14, 15), and he deals with it in our Epistle. See i. 5- 
ii. 6, 15-17, iti, 3-10. 

2. Cerinthus also was an Antinomian,® but his distinctive heresy 
was a theory of the Person of Christ. He taught in Asia, but he 
had been trained in Egypt,’ and the foundation of his system, as of 


PBR Ch 2 Tren. I. xxiii. 

3 Strom. iii. 4; cf. Eus. H. E. iii. 29. 4 Strom. ii. 20, 
5 Cf. Tert. Adv. Marc. i. 29; Hippol. Phil. vii. 36. 
®Tren., l.c. ’ De Prescript. Her. 33. 


8 Dionysius of Alexandria in Eus. H. E. iii. 28. 
9 Theodoret. H. E. ii. 3. 


INTRODUCTION 157 


Marcion’s, was that postulate of Greek philosophy—the inherent and 
necessary evil of matter. ‘He said that the world had not been 
made by the First God, but by a power which is separate from the 
Authority which is over the Universe and ignorant of the God who 
is over all. And he supposed that Jesus had not been begotten of a 
virgin, but had been born of Joseph and Mary asa son in like manner 
to all the rest of men, and became more righteous and prudent and 
wise. And after the Baptism the Christ descended into him from 
the Sovereignty which is over the Universe, in the form of a dove ; 
and then He proclaimed the unknown Father and accomplished 
mighty works, but at the end the Christ withdrew from the Jesus, 
and the Jesus had suffered and been raised, but the Christ had 
continued throughout impassible, being spiritual.” The essence of 
this is the dissolution (λύσις) of the Person of our Lord, the distinc- 
tion between the human Jesus and the divine Christ. St. John 
encountered Cerinthus at Ephesus, and strenuously controverted his 
error. Irenzeus and Eusebius quote a story of Polycarp’s that the 
Apostle once visited the public baths, and, seeing Cerinthus within, 
sprang out of the building. ‘Let us flee,” he cried, “lest the 
building fall, since Cerinthus, the foe of the Truth, is within it!” ? 
And all through our Epistle he has the heresy in view. See ii. 18- 
23, iv. 1-6, 13-15, v. 1-12. 

The Epistie has also a religious purpose. Its key-note is Love. 
“Locutus est multa,’ says St. Augustine, “et prope omnia de 
caritate.” Its doctrine of love is distinctive and profound. The 
love which it inculcates is love for God and love for the brotherhood 
of believers—love for God manifesting itself in love for the brother- 
hood, and love for the brotherhood inspired by the love wherewith 
the Father has loved all His children. Special emphasis is laid on 
the latter. It is the whole of religion, it is all that God requires (cf. 
ii. 8-11, iii, 10-18, iv. 7-v. 2); for it implies love for God, and love 
for God implies a right attitude of heart and mind toward Him. 
This is the dominant doctrine of the Epistle, and it was the constant 
message of the Apostle’s later ministry, so much so that, it is said, 
_ his people grew weary of its incessant reiteration. See St. Jerome’s 
story quoted in commentary on iv. 7. 

This had not always been his manner. He had not always been 
the Apostle of Love. He had once been the precise opposite— 
self-seeking (cf. Mark x. 35-45= Matt. xx. 20-28), fiery, passionate, 
and vindictive (cf. Luke ix. 51-56), meriting the title which Jesus 
gave him “the Son of Thunder” (Mark iii. 17). His doctrine of 


Δ Tren. I. xxi. 2 Tren. III. iii. 4; Eus. H. E. iv. 14, 


158" INTRODUCTION 


the Supremacy of Love was a late discovery, and he proclaims it 
as such (see commentary on ii. 7-11). It was not merely an article 
of his polemic, a protest against the loveless intellectualism where- 
with St. Ignatius charges the heretical teachers (τοὺς ἑτεροδοξοῦντας), 
who had ‘‘no concern for love, none for the widow, none for the 
orphan, none for the distressed, none for the bondman, none for the 
hungry or the thirsty.” 1 It was a personal confession. That was 
an aspect of the Gospel which St. John had himself too long failed 
to perceive ; and it may be that it had been revealed to him by two 
life-transforming experiences. (1) His Exile in Patmos (Rev. i. 9).? 
During that season of retirement he could look back over his inter- 
rupted ministry and review his methods. Incidents like his encounter 
with Cerinthus would recur to him, and would appear to his chastened 
spirit ill accordant with “the meekness and sweet reasonableness of 
Christ” (2 Cor. x. 1). It was right that he should contend for the 
Truth, but had not his intemperate zeal too often caused needless 
offence and defeated its own end by hardening the hearts of his 
opponents? He would discover the truth of St. Paul’s precept that 
“the Lord’s servant must not strive, but be gentle towards all ” (2 
Tim. ti. 24). (2) The writing of his Gospel. As he lived over again 
those three years of blessed fellowship and told ‘* what he had heard 
and seen concerning the Word of Life,” he would realise the pity 
and patience of the gentle Jesus, and feel as though he had never 
until that hour understood the Gospel-story. And he would address 


himself to what remained of his ministry in a new spirit. “ Little 
children, love one another.’ ‘‘Master, why do you always say 
this?” ‘Because it is the Lord’s commandment, and if only it 


be done, it is enough.” 


THe SECOND AND THIRD EPISTLES. 


There is no doubt that the Second and Third Epistles are from 
the same hand. Cf. 2 John 1 with 3 John 1; 2 John 4 with 3 John 
3, 4; 2 John 10 with 3 John 8; 2 John 12 with 3 John 13, 14. Are 
they also the work of St. John? 

This was a disputed question in the early Church. Eusebius in 
his chapter “ On the Acknowledged Divine Scriptures and those that 


1Ad Smyrn. vi. Cf. Barn. Ep. xx. 2: οὐκ ἐλεῶντες πτωχόν, οὐ πονοῦντες ἐπὶ 
καταπονουμένῳ . . . ἀποστρεφόμενοι τὸν ἐνδεόμενον Kal καταπονοῦντες TOY 
θλιβόμενον. 

2 Ῥυξ by Eus. H. Ε. iii. 23 in the reign of Domitian (a.p. 81-96), by Epiphan. 
Her. li. 33 in that of Claudius (a.p. 41-54). 


INTRODUCTION 159 


are not such (περὶ τῶν ὁμολογουμένων θείων γραφῶν kat τῶν μὴ τοιούτων) ! 
includes the Second and Third Epistles of John (4 ὀνομαζομένη δευτέρα 
καὶ τρίτη ᾿Ιωάννου) among “those that are controverted yet recognised 
by most (τῶν ἀντιλεγομένων, γνωρίμων δ᾽ οὖν ὅμως τοῖς πολλοῖς). So 
Origen:? “He (John) has left an epistle of a very few lines; also, 
let it be granted, a second and a third, since not all allow that these 
are genuine. However, there are not a hundred lines in them both.” 
And in the fourth century an opinion was put forward, which still 
finds favour, that their author was indeed John, only not John the 
Apostle but another John denominated “the Presbyter ’’.® 

There is, however, very strong evidence, both internal and ex- 
ternal, on the other side. They exhibit coincidences of thought and 
language which link them with the First Epistle. Cf. 1 John it. 7 
with 2 John 5; 1 John ii. 18, iv. 1-3 with 2 John 7; 1 John ii. 23 
with 2 John 9; 1 John iii. 6, 9 with 3 John 11. And the external 
testimony, though scanty, is weighty. The Muratorian Canon, 
despite the corruption of the passage, plainly attests the two epistles 
as works of the Apostle John and as accepted in the Catholic Church 
(superscripti Fohannis duas in catholica habentur). Irenzeus* quotes 
2 John 11 with the preface Ἰωάννης δὲ ὁ τοῦ Κυρίου μαθητὴς ἐπέτεινε τὴν 
καταδίκην αὐτῶν μηδὲ χαίρειν αὐτοῖς ip ὑμῶν λέγεσθαι βουληθείς. And 
again, after a reference to the First Epistle, he quotes 2 John 7, 8 as 
a saying of the Lord’s disciple John “in the aforesaid epistle’’.® 
This slip of memory only makes the attestation more effective. 
Irenzeus knew that it was a saying of St. John that he was quoting: 
the Second Epistle no less than the First was the Apostle’s. Clement 
of Alexandria too recognised more than one Epistle of St. John, for 
in one place he quotes 1 John v. 16 as occurring “in his larger 
Epistle (ἐν τῇ μείζονι ἐπιστολῇ), ὃ and elsewhere he speaks of “ the 
Second Epistle of John’’.7 

The ground for the ascription of the two smaller epistles to John 
the Presbyter is the fact that their author styles himself 6 πρεσβύτ- 
epos. But it can hardly be maintained in view of his self-revelation 
in the Third Epistle. He appears there as exercising authoritative 
supervision over a wide circle of churches, writing to them, visiting 
them, interfering in their dissensions and settling these by his per- 
sonal and solitary arbitrament, sending deputies and receiving their 


ΕΓ πὶ, 25. 

? Comm. in Ev. Foan. v. 3 (ed. Lommatzsch, vol. i., p. 165). 

5 Eus. H. E. iii. 39; cf. Jer. Script. Eccles. under ¥oannes Afostolus; Pafias. 
iS ix. 3. SIT xvite 8. 8 Strom. ii. 15. 

7 Adumbrat. in Ep. Foan. ii. 


φ 
160 INTRODUCTION 


reports. This is precisely the sort of ministry which, as we have 
seen,! St. John exercised in Asia Minor, and it would have been 
impossible for any lesser personage than an Apostle.? It may, 
moreover, be questioned whether such slight compositions as these 
two little letters would have won recognition had they not been 
recommended by the name of the Apostle John. And it was natural 
that the latter should style himself ὃ πρεσβύτερος. The term was 
not only an official designation (cf. 1 Tim. v. 1, 17, 19). The second 
generation of Christians used it of their predecessors, “the men 
of early days,” Mdnner der Vorzeit, who had witnessed the great 
beginnings. Thus, Papias uses it of the Apostles,’ and Irenzeus in 
turn uses it of Papias and his contemporaries. It was therefore 
natural that St. John, the last of the Apostles, the sole survivor of 
“the elder men,” should be known among the churches of Asia as 
6 πρεσβύτερος. 

And indeed it is very questionable whether this John the Pres- 
byter ever existed. He was discovered by Eusebius in the preface 
to Papias’ work Expositions of Dominical Oracles, but “it is well,” 
remarks Barth, “to distinguish between what Papias really says and 
what Eusebius has made of his words”. Here are the words of 
Papias: “I shall not hesitate to incorporate for you with my inter- 
pretations as many things as 1 once learned well from the elders 
(τῶν πρεσβυτέρων) and remembered well, guaranteeing their truth. 
For I did not, like so many, take pleasure in those that have so 
much to say but in those that teach the truth, nor in those that 
remember alien commandments but in those that remember the 
commandments that have been given by the Lord to the Faith and 
come from the Truth itself. Now if anywhere one came in my way 
who had been a follower of the elders (τοῖς πρεσβυτέροις), 1 would 
search® the words of the elders—what Andrew or Peter had said 
(εἶπεν), or what Thomas or James, or what John or Matthew, or any 
other of the Lord’s disciples; and (I would search) the things which 
Aristion and the elder John (6 πρεσβύτερος ᾿Ιωάννης), the Lord’s dis- 
ciples, say (λέγουσιν) ’’.® 

aSee Ὁ: 155- 

5 Cf. Barth, Die Hauptprobl., S. 26: “In der That nun ist diese ‘ patriarchalisch- 
monarchische’ Autoritat unerklarlich bei einem einfachen Presbyter einer Local- 


gemeinde; sie erklart sich aber vollkommen, wenn der πρεσβύτερος wie Paulus ein 
Apostel gewesen ist.” 

3Eus. H. E. iii. 39. ΑΨ, xxxvi. et passim. Similarly in Heb. xi. 2. 

5 ἀνέκρινον, not ‘enquire about”. Jerome (Script. Eccles. under Pafias) rightly 
tenders considerabam. 

§ Eus. H. E. iii. 39. 


INTRODUCTION 161 


And this is what Eusebius makes of the passage: “ Here it is 
worthy of observation how he twice enumerates the name of John. 
The former of these he reckons along with Peter and James and 
Matthew and the rest of the Apostles, plainly indicating the Evan- 
gelist; and the other John after an interval he ranks with others 
outside the number of the Apostles, having put Aristion before him, 
and he plainly names him ‘an elder (πρεσβύτερον); so that the 
truth of their story is hereby demonstrated who have said that two 
persons in Asia have had the same name, and there are two tombs 
in Ephesus and each is called John’s to this day.’’! Eusebius had a 
theological interest in putting this construction on the passage. He 
disliked the Chiliasm of the Apocalypse, and he was glad to find a 
second John to whom he could ascribe its authorship. And he has 
certainly perverted the passage. Papias is here defining the plan of 
his work. His method was (1) to quote a logion of Jesus, (2) to 
interpret it, and (3) to illustrate it by any story which he had gleaned 
from oral tradition. Such stories he derived from two sources. 
One was their followers’ reports of what they had heard from the 
lips of “the elders,” 1.6., as Papias used the term, the Apostles. 
These reports he “searched” for suitable illustrations. But he was 
not wholly dependent on hearsay. Two of the men who had been 
with Jesus were still alive in the earlier years of Papias—Aristion, 
not an Elder or Apostle but a disciple of the Lord, and the Elder 
John; and he enjoyed the advantage of hearing their living voices, 
and he “would search” their discourses for the material he required. 
The transition from “had said (εἶπεν) ᾿ to ‘‘say (λέγουσιν), though 
ignored by Eusebius, is significant and explains the double mention 
of St. John. Papias had derived his knowledge of St. John’s teach- 
ing from two sources: (1) from the reports of men who had com- 
panied with him and the other Apostles while they still tarried at 
Jerusalem, and (2) from his own lips after his settlement at Ephesus, 
where, Irenzeus says,? Papias had been one of his “hearers”’. 
6 πρεσβύτερος Ἰωάννης must mean “the Apostle John,” since the 
Apostles have just been called “the Elders” (τοῖς πρεσβυτέροις), 
and it is impossible that the term should bear different meanings 
within the compass of a single sentence. In his phrase “from the 
Truth itself (ἀπ᾿ αὐτῆς τῆς ἀληθείας) ᾿ Papias echoes 3 John 12, 
and this renders it more than likely that he called St. John 6 


1 Eusebius probably had this story from Dionysius of Alexandria (cf. H.E. vii. 
25). It means simply that in the fourth century there were two rival sites for St. 
John’s burial-place. 


SSEG\p. 151. 


162 INTRODUCTION 


πρεσβύτερος because the latter had so styled himself in each of the 
Epistles.! 


’ The Second Epistle is addressed ἐκλεκτῇ κυρίᾳ καὶ τοῖς τέκνοις 
αὐτῆς, and the meaning of the address is a disputed question.” It 
was supposed by St. Jerome,® and the idea is approved by many 
moderns, that “the elect lady” 4 is a figurative appellation, signifying 
either the whole Church (Hilgenfeld, Mangold) or a particular 
community (Hofmann, Ewald, Huther, Wieseler). The main argu- 
ments are that the universal affection spoken of in verse 1 could 
hardly have been felt for an individual, and that it is “not impro- 
bable”’ that this is the Epistle referred to in 3 John 9.5 The meta- 
phor is indeed paralleled by Eph. v. 22-33 and Rev. xxi. 9; but it is 
the Church which is thus designated, not a particular community, 
and, on the ecclesiastical interpretation, it is a particular community 
that is here addressed, since St. John sends greetings to the “elect 
lady” from “the children of her elect sister” (verse 13), 1.6., pre- 
sumably, his own congregation. And, moreover, the simplicity of the 
little letter precludes the possibility of so elaborate an allegory, while 
the tenderness of its tone stamps it as a personal communication. 

It is therefore not a church but a lady that is addressed, and 
there are authority and reason for regarding Kupia as her name. 
The name was common in those days, and it occurs, é.g., in the 
Oxyrhynchus Papyri, 498: ᾿Αντωνίᾳ ᾿Ασκληπιάδι τῇ καὶ Kupia. 914: 
Αὐρήλιος ᾿Απφοῦτος υἱὸς ᾿Αρεοῦτος μητρὸς Kupias. It is the Greek form 
of Martha, which means “mistress (domina)”. The objection has 
been urged that, if it be a proper name, St. John must have written 
not ἐκλεκτῇ Kupia but Kupia τῇ ἐκλεκτῇ On the analogy of Γαΐῷ τῷ 
ἀγαπητῷ in 3 John 1; but either construction is permissible. The 
former is paralleled by 1 Peter i. 1: ἐκλεκτοῖς παρεπιδήμοις, and if 


On the identity of John the Presbyter and John the Apostle see Barth, Haupt- 
probl., S. 26-29; Farrar, Early Days, Exc. xiv. 

* Cf. scholium quoted by Euth. Zig.: ἢ πρὸς ἐκκλησίαν γράφει ἢ πρός τινα 
γυναῖκα διὰ τῶν εὐαγγελικῶν ἐντολῶν τὴν ἑαυτῆς οἰκίαν οἰκονομοῦσαν mvev- 
ματικῶς. 

3 Ep. ad Ageruchiam. 

+ The words, however, can hardly mean more than “an elect lady”. 

5 Schmiedel in Encycl. Bibl., vol. ii., col. 2560. Cf. B. Weiss, Einleit. 

δ Others take “ExAextq as the name (“the lady Electa”). Clem. Alex.: “ad 
quandam Babyloniam (probably a confused reference, for which the translator is 
responsible, to 1 Peter v. 13) Electam nomine”’. Clement apparently took Electa 
as the Church personified, for he proceeds : “ significat electionem ecclesie sancte ”. 
But then Ἐκλεκτῆς in verse 13 must also be a proper name, and two sisters can 
hardly have borne the same name. 


INTRODUCTION 1623 


there be any irregularity, it is in the latter, where τῷ ἀγαπητῷ is a 
defining after-thought (cf. 1 John i. 2: τὴν ζωὴν τὴν αἰώνιον, “the life, 
the eternal life”). Carpzov would identify Kyria (Martha) with the 
sister of Lazarus and Mary. The family of Bethany disappear from 
the Gospel-story after the feast in Levi’s house at the beginning 
of the Passion-week. They probably fled to escape the fury of the 
rulers, and it is just possible that they had found a home in Asia 
Minor like so many other refugees from Palestine. And now 
Martha is living in one of the cities of St. John’s diocese, a widow 
with a grown-up family ; and it is natural that she should be dear to 
the Apostle and honoured by the whole Church. This is a pleasant 
fancy, but it is nothing more. 

The facts are sufficiently interesting. The epistle is addressed 
to a devout lady named Kyria, who resided in one of the cities near 
Ephesus with a grown-up family. It is remarkable how large a part 
was played by women in the life of the primitive Church, especially 
in Asia Minor,? and Kyria was an honourable and influential person- 
age not only in her own community but all over that wide area 
(verse 1). It is probable that, like that of Nympha at Colossz,’ her 
house was the meeting-place of the Church, according to the custom 
of those days when there were no ecclesiastical edifices; and it 
appears from verse 10 that she afforded hospitality to the itinerant 
evangelists of whom the Third Epistle speaks. A sister of Kyria, 
presumably deceased, had a family resident at Ephesus and con- 
nected with St. John’s congregation; and several of Kyria’s sons 
had visited their cousins. The Apostle had met with them and 
found them earnest Christians, and in the gladness of his heart 
he wrote to their mother, testifying his gratification, giving some 
kindly counsel very needful in those days of intellectual unrest, and 
expressing the hope that he might ere long visit her. 


The Third Epistle is addressed to “Gaius the beloved”. Gaius 
(never Caius) was one of the commonest of names, and there 
are three who bear it in the N.T. (1) Gaius of Macedonia (Acts xix. 
29), (2) Gaius of Derbe (Acts xx. 4), and (3) Gaius of Corinth 
(Rom. xvi. 23; 2 Cor. i. 14). The name being so common, our 
Gaius may very well have been different from all these, but it is 
affirmed in the interesting Synopsis Sacre Scripture ascribed to St. 
Athanasius that St. John composed his Gospel during his exile in 
Patmos and that Gaius of Corinth acted as his amanuensis and 


1See p. 154. * Cf. Ramsay, The Church in the Rom. Emp., p. 67. 
8 Col. iv. 15: Νύμφαν καὶ τὴν κατ᾽ αὐτῆς ἐκκλησίαν (WH Nest). 


164 INTRODUCTION 


published it at Ephesus! And it appears from the “Apostolic 
Constitutions” (vii. 46) that one Gaius was ordained by St. John 
first ‘‘ bishop” of Pergamum. 

Whatever be the value of these traditions, it is evident that 
Gaius was a prominent personage, probably bishop or presbyter, in 
one of the churches of Asia Minor, and St. Paul’s description of 
Gaius of Corinth, “the host of me and of the whole Church,” might 
have been written of him. Trouble had arisen in his congregation, 
the ringleader being Diotrephes, probably a wealthy layman. The 
primitive Church was rent by factions, each swearing by one or 
other of the great teachers (cf. 1 Cor. i. 10-17), and it may be that 
Diotrephes belonged to the Pauline faction and abjured St. John 
and disowned his authority.2, The actual truth, however, is that he 
was an opinionative and domineering man who insisted on having 
his own way in everything. The occasion of the trouble was a visit 
which had been paid to the Church of Gaius by a company of 
itinerant evangelists (wandernde Glaubensboten). This order of 
“ prophets” was a recognised institution. Their office was to travel 
about preaching to the Gentiles and seeking to win them to the 
Faith. There were sometimes unworthy men among them who 
traded on the Gospel and merited the stinging epithet of “ Christ- 
traffickers (χριστέμποροι), and very stringent regulations are laid 
down regarding them in the Didache ;* but their ministry was a 
needful and heroic one. They abandoned everything for Christ’s 
sake and, to obviate misrepresentation, took nothing from the Gen- 
tiles—no food, no lodging. Thus they were dependent on the good 
offices of the believers wherever they went, and it was a debt of 
honour to see that they suffered no lack. Gaius had given a hospit- 
able welcome to that company of “prophets”; but Diotrephes, 
disowning the Apostle’s authority, opposed the reception of his 
emissaries and would have denied them entertainment. On their 
return to Ephesus they reported the incident at a meeting of the 
Church; and St. John wrote this letter and sent it by Demetrius, 
commending the action of Gaius and intimating his intention of 

1 τὸ δὲ κατὰ ᾿Ιωάννην εὐαγγέλιον ὑπηγορεύθη τε ὑπ᾽ αὐτοῦ τοῦ ἁγίου ᾿Ιωάννου 
τοῦ ἀποστόλου καὶ ἠγαπημένου, ὄντος ἐξορίστου ἐν Πάτμῳ τῇ νήσῳ, καὶ ὑπὸ τοῦ 
αὐτοῦ ἐξεδόθη ἐν ᾿Εφέσῳ διὰ Γαΐου τοῦ ἀγαπητοῦ καὶ ξενοδόχου τῶν ἀποστόλων, 
περὶ οὗ καὶ Παῦλος Ῥωμαίοις γράφων φησί" ἀσπάζεται ὑμᾶς Γάϊος ὃ ξένος μου 
καὶ ὅλης τῆς ἐκκλησίας. 

31ὶι has been thought incredible that the great Apostle should have been so 
cavalierly treated (cf. verses 9, 10), but great men are usually less honoured by their 


contemporaries than by after generations. 
>xi-xili. Cf. 2 John τὸ, 11. 


INTRODUCTION 165 


visiting his Church at an early date and reducing the recalcitrant 
Diotrephes to order. 


Tue ΤΉΧΤ OF THE EPISTLES. 


The accompanying Greek text is the regia editio (1560) of Robert 
Stephanus (Etienne), commonly known in England as the Textus 
Receptus.1 Constructed from a few late and inferior MSS. when the 
science of Textual Criticism was yet unborn, it is far from satisfac- 
tory ; and the principal variants are presented in the critical notes, 
The long and patient labours of Mill, Bentley, Griesbach, Lachmann. 
Tregelles, Tischendorf, and Westcott and Hort have cleared away 
the rubbish of corruption and reduced uncertainty to a minimum; 
and Dr. Eberhard Nestle’s text (British and Foreign Bible Society) 
is probably a very close approximation to the sacred autographs. It 
is “the resultant of a collation” of the monumental recensions of 
Tischendorf (8th edition, 1869-72), Westcott and Hort (1881), and 
Bernhard Weiss (2nd edition, 1905). ‘‘ The readings adopted in the 
text are those in which at least two of these editions agree.” 

The materia critica is copious and excellent. 1. Greek MSS. :— 


ΟΝ Codex Sinaiticus, 4th c. Discovered by Tischendorf in 
1844 and 1859 in the monastery of St. Catherine at the 
foot of Mount Sinai. Now at St. Petersburg. 

A Codex Alexandrinus, 5th c. Brought from Alexandria to 
Constantinople by Cyril Lucar, Patriarch of Constantinople 
(d. 1638), and sent by him to King Charles I. in 1628 by 
the hand of Thomas Roe on the return of the latter from 
a Turkish embassy. Now in the British Museum. 

B Codex Vaticanus, 4th c. In the Vatican Library at Rome. 

C Codex Ephraemi, 5th c. A rescript or palimpsest, written 
over in 12th c. with a Greek version of thirty-eight 
treatises of Ephraemus Syrus. In the National Library’ 
at Paris. In 1834-35 the librarian Carl Hase had the 
original writing revived by a chemical process, the applica- 
of Giobertine tincture. The codex was written, probably 
in Egypt, in 5th c.; corrected first, probably in Palestine, 
in 6th c. (03), then, probably at Constantinople, in 9th c. 
(C8). 

K Codex Mosquensis, 9th c. Brought to Moscow from the 
monastery of St. Dionysius at Mount Athos. 


1See C. R. Gregory’s Pwdegomena to Tischendorf’s Nov. Test. Gr., pp. 
212 sqq. 
MOLES: Vi ΕῚ 


146 |. INTRODUCTION 


L Codex Angelicus Romanus, 9the. In the Angelic Library 
of the Augustinian monks at Rome. 

P Codex Porfirianus, 9th c. A palimpsest found by Tischen- 
dorf in 1862 among the books of Bishop Porfirius 
Chiovensis. 

D Codex Bezez, 5th or 6th c. In the Library of the Uni- 
versity of Cambridge, to which it was presented by 
Theodore Beza in 1581. The Greek text with a slavish 
Latin translation. Much mutilated, our Epistles being 
represented only by the Latin version of 3 John 11-15. 


These manuscripts are uncials,? and there are besides upwards of 
two hundred minuscules or cursives, ranging in date from 9th c. to 
16th c.® 


2. Ancient Versions : 4— 
Syriac— 

(1) Syrvg Peshitto or Vulgate, 3rd (Ὁ) c. Contains the 
First Epistle. 

(2) Syrph Philoxenian or Heraclean Version, 6th c. The 
three Epistles. 

(3) Syrbo Pococke’s edition (1630) of 2 Pet. and 2 and 3 
John from codex in Bodleian Library, Oxford. 


Vg Latin Vulgate, St. Jerome’s revision (4.0. 382-84). The 
three Epistles. 


Egyptian— 
(1) Cop Memphitic Version, 3rd (?)c. The three Epistles. 
(2) Sah Thebaic Version, 3rd (?) c. The three Epistles. 


Aeth Ethiopic Version, from 4th to 6thc. The three Epistles. 
Arm Armenian Version, 5th c. The three Epistles. 


These versions have no small value for the determination of the 
original text. It is usually plain which of several disputed readings 
the translator had before him, and whether his MS. contained a 
word or passage of doubtful authenticity. 


LITERATURE. 


Clem. Alex. Adumbrationes in Epp. Foan. i., ti. (a rude Latin 
translation) ; Didymus, the blind teacher of St. Jerome in the Cate- 
chetical School of Alexandria (a.p. 308-95), commentary on the 


1 Gregory, pp- 345 544. 
2 The signs * ? 5a bc affixed to uncials denote corrections by later hands. 
8 Gregory, pp. 616 seq. 4 Tbid., pp. 803 seq. 


INTRODUCTION 167 


Cath. Epp., translated into Latin by Epiphanius Scholasticus; Aug., 
In Epistolam Foannis Tractatus Decem (\st Ep., stopping abruptly- 
at v. 3); Bede, Expos.; Euthymius Zigabenus (12th c.), 

Erasmus, In Ν. T, Annotat.; Luther; Calvin (1st Ep.); Beza; 
Carpzov, Commentatio in Ep. 2 Foan.; in Foan. Ep. 3 Brevis Enar- 
ratio; Wetstein; Bengel; Liicke; Olshausen; Neander (1st Ep.) ; 
Disterdieck; Huther in Meyer (translated by T. & T. Clark); 
Braune in Lange; Alford; Haupt (Ist Ep., translated by T. ἃ T. 
Clark) ; Rothe, Der erste Brief fohannis practisch erklart (a beautiful 
work) ; Alexander in Speaker’s Commentary ; Plummer in Cambridge 
Bible ; Westcott, The Epistles of St. Fohn; H. J. Holtzmann in 
Hand-commentar zum Neuen Testament ; Bernhard Weiss, Die drei 
Briefe des Ap. Foh.; Parrar, Early Days of Christianity, chaps. 
xxxi-vii.; Cox, Private Letters of St. Paul and St. $ohn ; Maurice, 
Epistles of St. fohn ; Findlay, Fellowship in the Life Eternal ; Law, 
Tests of Life (Lectures on Ist Ep.).? 


1 The two last appeared after this commentary was written. 












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IQANNOY TOY AITOZTOAOY 


EMISTOAH KA@OAIKH ILPOQTH}. 


I. τ. Ὃ "ἮΝ > dm ἀρχῆς, ὃ ἀκηκόαμεν, ὃ “ ἑωράκαμεν τοῖς ὀφθαλ- 3 Rev. i. 4 


a 


Hots ἡμῶν, ὃ 


1 See Introd., p. 151. 


4 ἐθεασάμεθα, καὶ 3 αἱ χεῖρες ἡμῶν ° ἐψηλάφησαν περὶ Bebe it, 


2 Peter i. 


16. 
dJohni.14.  e Luke xxiv. 39; John xx. 27. 


2Tert. (de Anim. 17; adv. Prax. 15) quotes thus: quod vidimus, quod audivi- 
mus, oculis nostris vidimus et manus nostre contrectaverunt de sermone vite, as 
though reading ὃ ἐθεασάμεθα, ὃ ἀκηκόαμεν, ἑωράκαμεν τοῖς ὀφθαλμοῖς ἡμῶν, κιτιλ. 


Tue First EPIsTLe. 

CuapTEeR I,—Vv. 1-4. The Preface. 
“That which was from the beginning, 
which we have heard, which we have 
seen with our eyes, which we beheld and 
our hands felt, concerning the Word of 
Life—and the Life was manifested, and 
we have seen and testify and announce 
to you the Life, the Eternal Life, which 
was with the Father and was manifested 
to us—that which we have seen and 
heard, we announce to you also, that ye 
also may have fellowship with us. Yea, 
and our fellowship is with the Father and 
with His Son Jesus Christ. And these 
things we are writing that our joy may 
be fulfilled.” 

The Apostle here characterises and 
commends his Gospel (cf. Introd. p. 154). 
1. Its theme—the earthly life of Jesus. 
No mere biography, since Jesus» was not 
one of the children of men but the Eter- 
nal Son of God, the Word made flesh. 
(a) An ineffable wonder but no dream, an 
indubitable reality. His readers might 
doubt it, since they belonged to a later 
generation and had never seen Jesus ; 
but St. John had seen Him, and he as- 
sures them, with elaborate iteration, that 
it isno dream: ‘‘ These eyes beheld Him, 
these hands felt Him”. ““ Because,” 
says Calvin, ‘‘the greatness of the thing 
demanded that its truth should be certain 
and proved, he insists much at this point”. 
(δ) His narrative was necessarily incom- 
plete, since the infinite revelation was 
larger than his perception or understand- 
ing of it. ‘“‘ He would give only a little 


drop from the sea, not the sea itself” 
(Rothe). A complete biography of Jesus 
is impossible, since the days of His flesh 
are only a segment of His life, a moment 
of His eternal years. 2. His purpose in 
writing it: (a) that his readers might 
share his heavenly fellowship; (b) that 
his joy might be fulfilled. 

Ver. 1. 6, i.e. the Logos and the 
Eternal Life which He manifested. Cf. 
Vv. 4: πᾶν τὸ γεγεννημένον with note. 
ἦν, ‘“‘verbum eternitatis significativum 
non habentis initium” (Clem. Alex.). 
It ‘‘ was” ere it ‘‘was manifested”. ἀπ᾽ 
ἀρχῆς, ΓΝ TVD (Gen. i. 1). The 
Logos already was when time began. 
“The desizn of the Apostle is to remove 
the idea of novelty which could lessen 
the dignity of the Gospel” (Calvin). Cf. 
Athan., Synops. Script. Sacr. : θεολογῶν 
δὲ ἐξηγεῖται μὴ νεώτερον εἶναι τὸ καθ᾽ 
ἡμᾶς μυστήριον ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐξ ἀρχῆς μὲν 
ἀεὶ τυγχάνειν αὐτὸ νῦν δὲ πεφανερῶσθαι 
ἐν τῷ Κυρίῳ. ἀκηκόαμεν, ‘we have 
heard”; either the editorial “we” (cf. 
Rom. i. 5; Col. iv. 3); or, with Lightfoot, 
St. John and the elders of Ephesus who 
had certified the authorship and authen- 
ticity of the Gospel (xxi. 24); or “I and 
the rest of the Apostles ””—not hearsay 
but the testimony of eye - witnesses. 
ἐθεασάμεθα, “we beheld”—a spectacle 
which broke on our astonished vision. 
This seems to be the force of the transi- 
tion from perfect to aorist, though it may 
be simply an instance of the decay of 
the distinction between perfect and aorist 


170 


Lean % τοῦ λόγου τῆς ζωῆς 
g Jobni. 7, καὶ 
2 


Acts i. 8, 
ii. 32. 

h Heb. viii. 
6; Mar 
iv. 20 3 


Phil. iv. a. = eb Ἴμῶν εἶς 


1 6851: I, τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτοῦ ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ - 


k Ruta ii. 42. 


hates ἣν ' πρὸς τὸν πατέρα, καὶ ores ἡμῖν" 
i. ἀκηκόαμεν, ὀρ βαηθννι, ὑμῖν," 


111. 24; John xvii. 21 ; 2 Cor. xiii. 13. 


IQANOY A Ἢ 


2. καὶ ἡ ζωὴ ἐφανερώθη, καὶ ἑωράκαμεν, 


5 , ΘΗ νιν x Ν Ν 5.» 
ἘΠΕ τύΒΟ μεν, καὶ ἀπαγγέλλομεν ὑμῖν τὴν ζωὴν τὴν αἰώνιον, 


3. ὃ ἑωράκαμεν καὶ 


A tal , 
ἵνα καὶ ὑμεῖς "ὶ κοινωνίαν ἔχητε 


‘4 κοινωνία δὲ ἣ ἡμετέρα μετὰ τοῦ πατρὸς καὶ μετὰ 


4. καὶ ταῦτα ™ γράφομεν ὑμῖν, ἵνα 


m ii. 12, 13. 


lat υμιν SABCP, Syrvg, Sah., Aeth., Arm., edd. 


(see Moulton’s Gram. of N.T. Ghk., i. 
pp. 142f.). ἐψηλάφησαν : the word is 
used of the fumbling of a blind man in 
Gen. xxvii. 12 LXX py ποτε ψηλαφήσῃ 
με ὃ πατὴρ. περὶ, in Betreff des Wortes 
des Lebens (Holtzmann); i.e. ‘“‘ We did 
not grasp all the wonder but only its 
skirts”. ‘“ Vom Worte des Lebens will 
er verkiindigen, denn ihn selbst verkiin- 
digen zu k6énnen, dazu fihlte er sich 
nicht in Stande” (Rothe). τοῦ Λόγου 
τῆς ζωῆς, “1τ1πΠεὲ Word who gives life,” 
“des Wortes, ohne welches es kein 
Leben gibt” (Holtzmann). Calvin: 
“ Genitivus loco epitheti pro Vivifico”’. 
Rothe’s “das Wort vom Leben (the word 
concerning life)” is Pauline (cf. Phil. ii. 
16) but not Johannine. 

Ver. 2. A parenthesis reiterating the 
assurance of the reality of the manifesta- 
tion. The Apostle heaps assurance upon 
assurance with elaborate emphasis, and 
the cumbrousness of his language should 
not be removed by devices of construc- 
tion or punctuation, making ver. I a 
complete sentence: (1) “ That which 
was from the beginning (is) that which 
we have heard, etc.”; (2) ‘‘ That which 
was from the beginning, which we 
have seen... beheld, our hands also 
handled”. Cf. Tert. in crit. n. μαρ- 
τυροῦμεν, according to the Lord’s parting 
charge (cf. As XV. 27; Luke xxiv. 48 ; 
Acts i. 8). ἣ μαρτυρία Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ 
(Rev. i. a 9, xix. 10) was the apostolic 
amrayye ἀπαγγέλλομεν, κ. τ.λ.: 
Be ayhente 3 we gather that Christ cannot 
be preached to us without the Heavenly 
Kingdom being opened to us, so that, 
being wakened from death, we may live 
the life of God” (Calvin). Observe the 
note of wonder in the Apostle’s language. 
Speech fails him. He labours for ex- 
pression, adding definition to definition. 

Ver. 3. ὃ ἕωρ. καὶ ax., not merely a 
resumption but a reiteration of the pro- 
tasis. καὶ ὑμεῖς, “ye also” who have 
not seen Jesus. κοινωνίαν, not merely 
knowledge through hearsay of what the 
Apostles had known as eye-witnesses, 


but personal and direct communion with 
the living Lord. This St. John proceeds 
to make plain. The phrase καὶ. . . δὲ, 
et... vero, atque etiam, introduces an 
important addition or explanation (cf. 
John vi. 51, Vill. τὸ, τὴ, τὺ: 275) pActs 
XXil, 209; Heb: τα 1: ΡΘΕ τ᾿ π᾿ 
“Christ walks no longer in the flesh 
among us, but He appears still continu- 
ally to the world of men and reveals Him- 
self to those who love Him. Through faith 
a real personal contact with the Christ 
now glorified in the Spirit is possible” 
(Rothe). There is a gracious constraint 
on all who know this blessed fellowship 
to bring others into it. Cf. 1 Cor. ix. 
16. Bunyan, preface to The ¥erusalem- 
Sinner Saved : “I have been vile my- 
self, but have obtained mercy, and I 
would have my companions in sin par- 
take of mercy too, and therefore I have 
writ this little book”. 

Ver. 4. ἡμεῖς, clearly the editorial 
plural. The reading ὑμῶν seems at the 
first glance more attractive than ἡμῶν as 
evincing a generous solicitude on the 
part of the Apostle for the highest good 
of his readers, viz., the fulfilment of their 
joy. Rothe: ‘‘ Wer es weis, dass das 
uranfangliche Leben erschienen ist und 
er mit demselben und dadurch mit dem 
Vater Gemeinschaft haben kann, dessen 
Herz muss hoch schlagen”. In truth, 
however, ἡμῶν evinces a still more gener- 
ous solicitude—the very spirit of Jesus. 
As He could not be happy in Heaven 
without us, so the Apostle’s joy was in- 
complete unless his readers shared it. 
Cf. Samuel Rutherford :— 


“Oh! if one soul from Anwoth 
Meet me at God’s right hand, 

My heaven will be two heavens 
In Immanuel’s land.” 


Vv. 5-10. The Message of the Incar- 
nation and the Duty which it brings. 
“And this is the message which we 
have heard from Him and are announc- 
ing to you, that God is light, and dark- 
ness—in Him there is none. If we say 


2—7- 


" ἡ χαρὰ ἡμῶν 1 ἡ πεπληρωμένη. 5. Kat αὕτη ἐστὶν 2 ἡ ° ἐπαγγελία 
ἣν ἀκηκόαμεν ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ, καὶ ἢ ἀναγγέλλομεν ὑμῖν, ὅτι 6 Θεὸς φῶς 
ἐστι, καὶ “ σκοτία ἐν αὐτῷ οὐκ ἔστιν οὐδεμία. 
κοινωνίαν ἔχομεν μετ᾽ αὐτοῦ, καὶ ἐν τῷ σκότει περιπατῶμεν, ψευ- 
δόμεθα, καὶ οὐ ποιοῦμεν τὴν ἀλήθειαν - 
περιπατῶμεν, ὡς αὐτός ἐστιν ἐν τῷ φωτί, κοινωνίαν ἔχομεν μετ᾽ 


> , var a = τ A a 
ἀλλήλων, καὶ “τὸ αἷμα Ἰησοῦ Xpictod* τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτοῦ καθαρίζει ὃ 


1 Peter i. 12. 


12, xii. 35, 36. 5 Exod. x. 22, 23. 


Syrvg, Sah., edd. 
Ξεστιν αὐτὴ  ΒΟΚΤΨ,Ρ, edd. 


6 


IQANOY A 


q John i. 4, 5, 8, 9, viii. 12, ix. 5; James i. 17. 
t Heb. ix. 13, 14. 


lypwvy ACKP, Syrph., Vg., Cop., Aeth., 


11 


8 n John iii. 
20, XV. II, 
Xvi. 24, 
Xvii. 13 
2 John 
12. With 
id cf. 
3 John, 4. 
7. "ἐὰν δὲ ἐν τῷ φωτὶ o iti. τι. 
; p Matt. 

XXVili. ΤΙ; 
ΕΞ John iv. 
25, ΧΥΪ. 12, 
Set Sc) os 
r ii. 4, John iii. 19-21 ; John, viii. 


6. " ἐὰν εἴπωμεν ὅτι 


Arm., Aug. ; ἡμῶν SBL, many minusc., 


Sayyedta NCABKL, Syrve., Vg. (annuntiatio), Aeth., Arm., Aug. (annuntiatio), 


‘\Inoov Χριστου AKL, Syrph, Vg., Cop., Tert. (de Pudic. 19), Aug.; om. Χρισ- 


του BCP, Syrvg, Sah., Arm., edd. 


" καθαρισει or καθαριει some lesser authorities, Cop., Sah., Aug. (purgabit). 


that we have fellowship with Him and be 
walking in the darkness, we lie and are 
not doing the Truth; but if we be walk- 
ing in the light, as He is in the light, we 
have fellowship with one another, and 
the blood of Jesus His Son cleanseth us 
from every sin. If we say that we have 
not sin, we are deceiving ourselves and 
the Truth is not in us. If we confess 
our sins, faithful is He and righteous to 
forgive us the sins and cleanse us from 
every unrighteousness. If we say that 
we have not sinned, we are making Him 
a liar and His Word is not in us.” 

Ver. 5. ἀγγελία in N.T. only here 
and iii. 11. ἐπαγγελία could only mean 
“promise” (cf. ii. 25). ἀπαγγέλλειν and 
ἀναγγέλλειν both mean “ announce ” the 
former with reference to the source of 
the message (ἀκηκόαμεν ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ) and 
the latter to its destination. “ Quod 
Filius annunciavit, renunciat apostolus” 
(Haupt). οὐκ ἔστιν οὐδεμία : the double 
negative makes a stronger negative (c/. 
Luke xxiii. 53). The manifestation of 
God in Christ was to those who beheld it 
a splendid glory, the breaking of a great 
light into the darkness of a sinful and 
sorrowful world. Cf. Matt. iv. 14-16. 
Light means warmth, health, sight, in a 
word “ life” (cf. ver. 2). 

Light is given that we may “ walk in 
it” and enjoy its blessings. It is thus 
that the Gospel attains its end and ful- 
fils its purpose in us. The Apostle now 
proceeds to warn his readers against two 
heresies which ignored this condition of 
heavenly fellowship. 

Vv. 6,7. The, heresy of Antinomian- 
ism, represented by the Nicolaitans (cf. 
Introd. p; 156). ἐὰν εἴπωμεν, a gentle 


and charitable hypothesis. He does not 
charge his readers with actually hold- 
ing this pernicious doctrine, and he 
includes himself (‘‘we,” not “γε. 


περιπατεῖν, Heb. “J Prt, of the whole 
“ὌΝ 


course of life. The Greek phrase is 
ἀναστρέφεσθαι (conversart). God is 
light and sin darkness, peccata tenebre 
sunt (Aug.), and it is impossible to be 
living in sin or compromising with it and 
at the same time be enjoying fellowship 
with God. ψευδόμεθα : we may believe 
the lie, being self-deceived (ver. 8) ; for 
disobedience to the Truth blinds us to it. 
Knowledge comes by doing (¢/. John vii. 
17). τὴν ἀλήθειαν, see note on ver. 8. 
‘Walking in the light ” has two blessed 
results: (x) ‘fellowship with one 
another,” which may mean either fellow- 
ship with God—He with us and we with 
Him (Aug., Calv.), or communion of 
saints—our fellow-believers with us and 
we with them. In fact the one idea im- 
plies the other. They are inseparable. 
Communion with our brethren is the 
consequence and evidence of communion 
with God. Cf. iv. 20. (2) ‘‘ Cleansing 
in the blood of Jesus.” τὸ αἷμα ᾿Ιησοῦ, 
God’s Infinite Sacrifice for the sin of the 
world—a N.T. phrase of peculiar poig- 
nancy and fragrance. Cf. Ignat. ad 
Rom. vii.: τὸ αἷμα αὐτοῦ, ὅ ἐστιν ἀγάπη 
ἄφθαρτος. When we walk in the light, 
that demonstration of the length to 
which God has gone in sacrifice for our 
sakes, is ever before us, and the amazing 
spectacle subdues our hearts, takes pos- 
session of them, and drives out every evil 
affection. Cf. Catherine of Siena: ‘‘ The 
blood and tears of the Divine Son are able 


172 


u John ix. 
41, XV. 22, 
24, Xix.11. 

V ii. 26, iii. 
7, iv. τ 
Rev. i 


ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ πάσης ἁμαρτίας. 


IQANOY A Ἃ 


Ξ᾿ ε x v ~ Ν 
εχομεν, EQAUTOUS πλανῶμεν, και 


8—10. II. 
8. "Edy εἴπωμεν St." ἁμαρτίαν οὐκ 


Q- 


“4 ἀλήθεια οὐκ ἔστιν ἐν ἡμῖν. 


5 ἐὰν ὁμολογῶμεν τὰς ὁμάρταις ἡμῶν, πιστός ἐστι καὶ δίκαιος, ἵνα 


om xii. 9; ἀφῇ ἡμῖν τὰς nae kal καθαρίσῃ ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ πάσης ἀδικίας. 


Io. ἐὰν εἴπωμεν ὅτι οὐχ il a ls a * ψεύστην ποιοῦμεν αὐτόν, 


I. " Τεκνία μου, ταῦτα γράφω ὑμῖν, ἵνα μὴ ἁμάρτητε: καὶ 


8 1. 8, ii. 4; John v. 38, viii. 37. a Gal. iv. 19 


the strength and activity of the sinful 
principle (ἢ ἁμαρτία) in our souls. This, 
however, is no reason fordespair. There 


xxii. som 

XXIV. 4,5, , 

11,24. καὶ “ὃ λόγος αὐτοῦ οὐκ ἔστιν ἐν ἡμῖν. 
W ii. 4. 
x Ps, xxxii. 1 

5; Prov. 

XXvili. 13. y Rom. iii. 26. z Rom. iii. 4. 

(T.R., WH). Cf, comm. 
to cleanse us from headto foot”. πάσης 
ἁμαρτίας, ‘‘every sin,’ i.e. every out- 
break of the sinful principle; not ‘all 
sin” (πάσης τῆς ἁμαρτίας). Cf. Rom. 


11, το: πᾶν στόμα. . . πᾶς ὁ κόσμος. 
Vv. 8-10. The heresy of Perfec- 
tionism. Some might not say, with the 
Antinomians, that they were absolved 
from the obligation of the moral law, but 
they maintained that they were done 
with sin, had no more sinful propensities, 
committed no more sinful acts. In op- 
position hereto the Apostle asserts two 
facts: (x) Inherent corruption. Ὁ 15- 
tinguish 4 ἁμαρτίαν ἔχειν (“το have sin”) 
and ἁμαρτάνειν (‘‘ to sin’’), corresponding 
to the sinful principle and its manifesta- 
tion in specific acts. Our natures are 
poisoned, the taint is in our blood. 
Grace is the medicine, but recovery is a 
protracted process. It is begun the 
moment we submit ourselves to Christ, 
but all our lives we continue under treat- 
ment. σπλανῶμεν, ‘lead astray” (cf. 
Matt. xviii. 12). 4 ἀλήθεια, in Johan- 
nine phraseology not simply ‘‘ der Wahr- 
heitssinn, die Wahrhaftigkeit der 
Selbstprifung und der Selbsterkennt- 
niss” (Rothe), but the revelation of 
“the True God” (ver. 20; John xvii. 3), 
which came “through Jesus Christ” 


(John i. 17), Himself ‘the Truth” 
(John xiv. 6). Nearly equivalent to 
6 Adyos (ver. 10). The Truth is a 


splendid ideal, never realised here, else 
it would cease to be an ideal; always as 
we pursue it displaying a fuller glory, 
And thus the nearer we approach it the 
further off it seems; when we walk in 
the light we see faults which were hidden 
in the darkness. Self-abasement is a 
characteristic of the saints. When Juan 
de Avila (A.D. 1500-69) was dying the 
rector of his college approached him and 
said: ‘“ What joy it must be to you to 
think of meeting the Saviour!” “Ah!” 
said the saint, ‘‘rather do I tremble at 
the thought of my sins.” (2) The fre- 
quent falls of the believer. We all 
*‘ have sinned (ἡμαρτήκαμεν),᾽ i.€., com- 
mitted acts of sin (ἁμαρτίας) manifesting 


is a remedy—forgiveness and cleansing 
in the blood of Jesus; and there is a 
way of obtaining it—confession. πιστός, 
i.e., to His promise (cf. Heb. x. 23). 
δίκαιος : He would be unrighteous if 
He broke His promise ratified by the 
blood of Jesus. Peace is not got by 
denying our sinfulness and our sins, but 
by frankly confessing them and availing 
ourselves, continually and repeatedly, of 
the gracious remedy. ‘‘ Woe to that 
soul which presumes to think that he 
can approach God in any other way 
than as a sinner asking mercy. Know 
yourself to be wicked, and God will wrap 
you up warm in the mantle of His good- 
ness” (Juan de Avila). ‘‘ Remission of 
sins cannot be sundered from penitence, 
nor can the peace of God belong to con- 
sciences where the fear of God does not 
reign ” (Calv.). 

Perfectionism has two causes: (1) The 
stifling of conscience: “ΜῈ make Hima 
liar, t.e., turn a deaf ear to His inward 
testimony, His voice in our souls. (2) 
Ignorance of His Word: it ‘‘is not in 
us’. Such a delusion were impossible 
if we steeped our mindsin the Scriptures. 


Consider the lapses of the saints, ¢.g., 
David, Peter. 

CHAPTER II.— Vv. 1, 2. The Remedy 
for the Sins of Believers. ‘ My little 


children, these things I am writing to 
you in order that ye may not sin. And 
if any one sin an Advocate have we with 
the Father—Jesus Christ, a righteous 
One. And He is Himself the propitia- 
tion for our sins, and not for ours only 
but also for the whole world.” 

Ver. 1. Observe the sudden change in 
the Apostle’s manner. His heart is very 
tender toward his people, and he adopts 
an affectionate and personal tone: (1) 
He passes from the formal ‘‘ we” to 
“I”. (2, He styles them texvia pov, 
filioli mei, meine Kindlein—his favourite 
appellation (cf. ἢ. 12. 28 3/31. 7, τϑ ive 
4; “.- 21). Not only was it very suitable 


I—2. 


27 ¢ b , 3, c N Η , 3 a 
ἐάν τις ἁμάρτῃ, " παράκλητον ἔχομεν “ πρὸς τὸν πατέρα, ᾿Ιησοῦν 

f Ὁ “- A 
Χριστὸν “ δίκαιον - 2. καὶ αὐτὸς “ἵλασμός ἐστι ᾿ περὶ τῶν ἁμαρτιῶ 


Luke xxiii. 47; Acts vii. 52, xxii. 14 5 1 Peter iii, 18. 


IQANOY A 


173 


Ὁ Cf. comm. 

Ci. 2. 

yd Matt. 
XXVii. 19 5 

e In N.T. only here and iv. 10, ἱλαστήριον 


Rom. iii. 25 ; Heb. ix. 5 ; ἱλάσκεσθαι Luke xviii. 13; Heb. ii. 17. f Rom. viii. 3. 


on the lips of the aged teacher, but it 
was a phrase of Jesus (cf. John xiii. 33). 
St. John had caught the phrase and its 
spirit. He remembered how the Master 
had dealt with His disciples, and he 
would deal with his people after the 
same fashion and be to them what Jesus 
had been to himself—as gentle and 
patient. 

He assumes this tone because he is 
about to address a warning to them, and 
he would fain take the sting out of it and 
disarm opposition. He foresees the 
possibility of a two-fold perversion of his 
teaching: (1) ‘‘If we can never in this 
life be done with sin, why strive after 
holiness? It is useless; sin is an abid- 
ing necessity”. (2) ‘If escape be so 
easy, why dread falling into sin? We 
may sin with light hearts, since we 
have the blood of Jesus to cleanse us.” 
“No,” he answers, ‘‘I am not writing 
these things to you either to discourage 
you in the pursuit of holiness or to em- 
bolden you in sinning, but, on the con- 
trary, in order that (ἵνα) ye may not sin.” 
Cf. Aug.: ‘Lest perchance he should 
seem to have given impunity to sins, 
and men should now say to themselves, 
*Let us sin, let us do securely what we 
will, Christ cleanses us; He is faithful 
and righteous, He cleanses us from all 
iniquity,’ he takes from thee evil security 
and implants useful fear. It is an evil 
-wish of thine to be secure; be anxious. 
For He is faithful and righteous to for- 
give us our sins, if thou art always dis- 
pleasing to thyself and being changed 
until thou be perfected.” As a physician 
might say to his patient: ‘‘ Your trouble 
is obstinate ; the poison is in your blood, 
and it will take a long time to eradicate 
it. But I donot tell you this to discourage 
you or make you careless; no, on the 
contrary, to make you watchful and dili- 
gent in the use of the remedy”; so the 
Apostle says: ‘‘ My little children, these 
things I am writing to you in order that 
ye may not sin”. 

If, however, we fall into sin, let us not 
lose heart, for Παράκλητον ἔχομεν πρὸς 
τὸν Πατέρα. παράκλητος, “one called 
to your side,” so, in a forensic sense, 
‘one who undertakes and champions 
your cause,” ‘fan advocate”. Vulg., 
Advocatus ; Luth., Fitrsprecher bet dem 
Vater. Here of the ascended Jesus; in 
John xiv. 16, 26, xv. 26, xvi. 7, of the 
Holy Spirit, where Vulg. simply trans- 


literates Paracletus, and both our ver- 
sions give “‘ Comforter,” Luth., Trdster 
—an impossible rendering, since the 
word is not act. but pass. Render 
‘“* Advocate” in every case. Cf. saying 
of R. Litezer ben Jacob: ‘‘ He who does 
one commandment has gotten him one 


advocate (ards5 5, παράκλητος), 
and he who has committed one trans- 
gression has gotten him one accuser 


(Δ Ρ’ κατήγορος). Repentance and 
good works are as a shield in the face of 
punishment.” In the days of His flesh 
Jesus was God’s Advocate with men. 
He told the Eleven in the Upper Room 
that, though He was going away, God 
would not be left without an Advocate 
on the earth to plead His cause and win 
men to faith (John xvi. 16, 17). The 
Holy Spirit has come in the room of 
Jesus, and still from age to age performs 
the office of God’s Advocate with men. 
Nor has the advocacy of Jesus ceased. 
He is our Advocate in Heaven, pleading 
our cause with God. The history of 
redemption is thus a progressive economy 
of grace: (1) the O.T. dispensation, 
when God was conceived as remote in 
high Heaven; (2) that of the Incarna- 
tion, when He revealed Himself as a 
Father and, by the advocacy of His 
Eternal Son, made His appeal to the 
children of men; (3) that of the Holy 
Spirit, under which we live in the enjoy- 
ment of a double advocacy—our Glorified 
Redeemer’s, who ‘‘maketh intercession 
for us” (Rom. viii. 34) in the Court of 
Heaven (cf. Christina Rossetti’s Verses, 
p. 41: “Day and night the Accuser”), 
and the Holy Spirit’s down here, wooing 
us to faith by His gracious importunities. 
δίκαιον, Rothe: ‘Only the righteous 
One, the guiltless, the One that is sepa- 
rate from sin, can be the Advocate with 
God for sinners, in general the Mediator 
of salvation, and make His friendship for 
us prevalent with God, because only such 
a one has access to God and fellowship 
with God (Heb. vii. 26; 1 Peter iii. 18; 
John xvi. 8, 10)”. ‘* What better advo- 
cate could we have for us, than He that 
is appointed to be our judge?” (Jer. 
Taylor, The Great Exemplar, I. i. 3). 
Ver. 2. Our Advocate does not plead © 
that we are innocent or adduce extenu- 
ating circumstances. He acknowledges 
our guilt and presents His vicarious 


174 


IQANOY A 


IT. 


Benn. 29 ἡμῶν - οὐ περὶ τῶν ἡμετέρων δὲ μόνον, ἀλλὰ Kal περὶ ὅλου © τοῦ 


ili. 16 


sina y xiii, kéopou. 3. Kai " ἐν τούτῳ γινώσκομεν ὅτι ἐγνώκαμεν αὐτόν, ἐὰν 

- - i ~ -“ A 

a eel ‘tas ἐντολὰς αὐτοῦ τηρῶμεν. 4. ὃ bos teh δον μὰν αὐτόν,᾽᾿ καὶ 
Χο; eT τὰς ἐντολὰς αὐτοῦ μὴ Pulte ψεύστης ἐστί, καὶ " ἐν τούτῳ ἡ ἀλήθεια. 
xiv. 12; οὐκ ἔστιν: 5. ὃς δ᾽ ἂν ' τηρῇ αὐτοῦ τὸν λόγον, ἀληθῶς ἐν τούτῳ 7%}, 
via 


XXViii. 20; 2 Cor. vii. 19. k i. 6, 8. 


1 John viii. 51, 52, 55, Xiv. 23, XV. 20, xvii. 6; Rev. iii. 8. 


1 λέγων ott SAB, edd. 


work as the ground of our acquittal. He 
stands in the Court of Heaven ἀρνίον ὡς 
ἐσφαγμένον (Rev. v. 6) and the marks of 
His sore Passion are a mute but eloquent 
appeal: “1 suffered all this for sinners, 
and shall it go for naught ?”’ περὶ ὅλου 
τοῦ κόσμου, pro totius mundi (Vulgate), 
‘for the sins of the whole world”. This 
is grammatically possible (cf. Matt. v. 
20), but it misses the point. There are 
sins, special and occasional, in the be- 
liever ; there is stm in the world; it is sin- 
fulthrough and through. The Apostle 
means “for our sins and that mass of 
sin, the world”. Cf. Rothe: “ Die 
‘Welt’ ist ihrem Begriff zufolge tber- 
haupt stindig, ein Sindenmasse, und hat 
nicht blos einzelne Stinden an sich”. 
The remedy is commensurate with the 
malady. Bengel: ‘‘ Quam late patet 
peccatum, tam late profitiatio”’. 
Observe how the Apostle classes him- 
self with his readers: ‘“‘we have,” ‘‘ our 


sins *—a rebuke of priestcraft. Cf. 
Aug.: “ But some one will say: ‘Do 
not holy men pray for us? Do not 


bishops and prelates pray for the people?’ 
Nay, attend to the Scriptures, and see 
that even the prelates commend them- 
selves to the people. For the Apostle 
says to the common folk ‘ withal praying 
for us’. The Apostle prays for the folk, 
the folk for the Apostle. We pray for 
you, brethren; but pray ye also for us. 
Let all the members pray for one an- 
other, let the Head intercede for all.” 
Vv. 3-6. The Proof of our Interest 
in Christ’s Propitiation and Advocacy. 
Ὁ And herein we get to know that we 
know Him—if we observe His command- 
ments. He that saith ‘I know Him,’ 
and observeth not His commandments, 
is a liar, and in this man the Truth is 
not ; but whosoever observeth His Word, 
truly in this man the love of God hath 
been carried to its end. Herein we get 
to know that we are in Him; he that 
saith he abideth in Him is bound, even 
as the Lord (ἐκεῖνος) walked, himself also 
so to walk.” The Apostle foresees a 
question which may be raised: “ How 
can I be assured that Christ is all this 


to me—my Propitiation, my Advocate ὃ 
And how can 1 be assured that I have: 
an abiding interest in Him?” He an- 
swers: (1) We attain to personal and 
conscious acquaintance with Christ by 
observance of His commandments (3- 56) : 

(2) we attain to assurance of abiding 
union with Him by “ walking even as. 
He walked” (56, 6). 

Ver. 3. The principle is that it is not 
enough to understand the theory; we 
must put it into practice. E.g., what 
makes an artist? Not merely learning 
the rules of perspective and mixture of 
colours, but actually putting one’s hand 
to brush and canvas. First attempts. 
may be unsuccessful, but skill comes by 
patient practice. Cf. Rembrandt’s ad- 
vice to his pupil Hoogstraten: ‘Try to 
put well in practice what you already 
know; and in doing 50 you will, in good 
time, discover the hidden things which 
you inquire about’. To know about 
Christ, to understand the doctrine of His 
person and work is mere theory; we get 
to know Him and to know that we 
know Him by practice of His precepts. 
γινώσκω (cognosco) is to οἶδα (scio) as 
γίνομαι (fro) to εἰμί (sum). ἐγνώκαμεν, 
cognovimus, “ΜῈ have got to know,’ 
1.6. “we know” τηρεῖν, “keepa watch- 
ful eye upon” "Cf. Matt. xxvii. 36: καὶ. 
καθήμενοι ἐ ἐτήρουν αὐτὸν ἐκεῖ. 

Ver. 4. μὴ τηρῶν, in classical Greek 
a gentle hypothesis, merely suggesting a 
possible case; but in later Greek μή is 
the regular negative with participles. It 
was an actual error, else the Apostle 
would hardly have spoken so emphatic- 
ally about it. ψεύστης, see note on i, 6. 
ἀλήθεια, see note on i. 8. 

Ver.5. ἣ ἀγάπη Tov Θεοῦ, “ the love of 


God,” is ambiguous like mim Nak, 


amor Dei, l’ amore di Dio, Vamour de 
Dieu, die Liebe Gottes. It might be 
objective genitive, ‘love for God,” “die 
Liebe zu Gott” (Rothe). But the be- 
liever’s love for God is never perfected in 
this life. The genitive is subjective (cf. 
iv. 9), amor Dei erga hominem, per 
Christum nobis reconciliatus (Bengel), 


3—38, 


ἢ ἀγάπη τοῦ Θεοῦ τετελείωται. 
n > 1 
ἐσμεν. 


Ν ‘ 
πάτησε, καὶ αὐτὸς oUTw” * 


" καινὴν γράφω ὑμῖν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐντολὴν παλαιάν, ‘Hv εἴχετε ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς" 
ἡ ἐντολὴ ἡ παλαιά ἐστιν 6 λόγος ὃν ἠκούσατε ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς. 8. 
πάλιν ἐντολὴν καινὴν γράφω ὑμῖν, ὅ ἐστιν ἀληθὲς ἐν αὐτῷ καὶ ἐν 


4:7. 
Heb. v. 12. 


q Cf. comm. 
Mark i. 27. } 


1 Punct. ἐσμεν > WH, Nest. 


JQANOY A 


ἐν τούτῳ γινώσκομεν ὅτι ἐν αὐτῷ '' 
6. ὃ λέγων ° ἐν αὐτῷ μένειν, » ὀφείλει, καθὼς 4 ἐκεῖνος περιε- 
περιπατεῖν. 7. ἀδελφοί, οὐκ ἐντολὴν 


175 


iv. 12, 17, 
18; Luke 
ΧΙ, 32; 
John iv. 
34, ν. 36, 
XVii. 4, 23 
Heb. ii. 
ΤΟΙ X. I, 
14, Xi. 40 
n 2 Cor. v. 
17 
o John xv. 


p iii. 16, iv. 11; 3 John δ; John xiii. 14; Matt. xxiii. 16, 18 ; Luke xvii. 10; Rom. xv. 1 
r Eph. v. 2; Col. ii. 6. 
t John xiii. 34, xv. 12; Mark xii. 29-31. 


s Matt. xiii. 52, xxvi. 28, 29, xxvii. 60 


2 kat avtos ουτως SYCKP, Syrph, Cop., Arm., Tisch., Nest.; om. ovtws AB, Vg. 


Sah., Aeth., Aug., WH. 


5 ἀγαπήτοι SABCP, Syrve ph, Vg., Cop., Sah., Arm., Aug., edd. 
4am apyyns om. SABCP, many minusc., Syrvs ph, Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm. 


Aug., edd. 


and the idea is that the redeeming love 
of God has attained its end in the man 
who observes His Word. Cf. Isa. liii. 
τι. St. Augustine understands “the love 
of God” as His love for sinners, a for- 
giving love like that of Jesus when He 
prayed on the Cross “Father, forgive 
them”. ‘* What is the perfection of 
love? It is both to love one’s enemies 
and to love them in order that they may 
be brethren.” By cultivating a love like 
this we get to know that we know Him. 
ἐν τούτῳ (b) points forward to 6 λέγων, 
K.7.A., introducing a second assurance. 
It is not enough to know Him; we must 
be sure of continuing in fellowship with 
Him, of “abiding in Him” to the end. 
This assurance comes by “ walking even 
as He walked”; i.e. the conformation 
of our lives to His is an evidence 
of our abiding interest in Him, our 
vital union with Him. We get like 
Him by imitating Him, and our likeness 
to Him is an irrefragable evidence to 
ourselves and the the world that we are 
His, as a son’s likeness to his father 
proves their relationship. ὀφείλει, “is 
bound,” “ist schuldig ” (Rothe), of moral 
obligation. The claim (λέγων) must be 
honourably attested. αὐτὸς in this sec- 
tion refers grammatically to Jesus Christ 
vy. I, 2). The change of pronoun (ἐκεῖ- 
vos) does not imply a change of person, 
since here as in ili. 3, 5, 7, 16, iv. 17, 
ἐκεῖνος is not a mere pronoun, It is 
used like 2116, and signifies “‘that great 
One,” “the Master”. Cf. 2 Tim. il. 12, 
13. περιπατεῖν, see note oni.6. Aug.: 
‘‘ Perhaps He admonishes us to walk in 
the sea. Far from it! He admonishes 
us to walk in the way of righteousness.” 

Vv. 7-11. A New Meaning in an Old 
Commandment. “ Beloved, it is no new 
commandment that I am writing to you, 


but an old commandment which ye had 
from the beginning. The old command- 
ment is the word which ye heard. Again, 
it is a new commandment that 1 am 
writing to you—a thing which is true in 
Him and in you, because the darkness is 
passing away and the light, the true 
light, is already shining. He that saith 
he is in the light and hateth his brother 
is in the darkness even until now. He 
that loveth his brother abideth in the 
light, and there is no stumbling-block in 
his way; but he that hateth his brother 
is in the darkness, and walketh in the 
darkness, and knoweth not where he is 
going, because the darkness hath blinded 
his eyes.” 

St. John has lately discovered the 
supremacy of Love in the Christian 
revelation (see Introd. pp. 157 f.). His im- 
perfect realisation of this has been the 
defect of his teaching hitherto, and he 
would now repair it: ‘It is not a new 
commandment that I am writing to you; 
it is part of the Gospel which I have 
been preaching to you all along. But I 
have never adequately understood it, and 
therefore it is new to your ears as it is to 
my heart.” 

Ver.7. ἀγαπητοί, St. John’s favourite 
style (cf. iii. 2, 21, iv. 1, 7; 11). About 
to enjoin love, he begins by loving. 
καινός, “novel,” ‘new in kind” (novus) 
as distinguished from νέος, “new in 
time” (vecens). am ἀρχῆς͵, here not as 
in i. 1, but ‘from the beginning of your 
Christian life”. ἡ ἐντολὴ 4 παλαιά, cf. 
i. 2: τὴν ζωὴν τὴν αἰώνιον. 

Ver. 8. πάλιν, “again,” ͵.6. in an- 
other sense, from another point of view, 
not in itself but in our recognition of it, 
“it is a new commandment”. 6 ἐστιν 
ἀληθές, in apposition to évroAnv—‘‘a 
thing which is true,” viz., the paramount 


176 
ui. 5-7. 
v Ver. 17; 


Bie 


IQANOY A 


II, 


a A , ὰ 
ὑμῖν - ὅτι "ἡ σκοτία ᾿παράγεται, καὶ “τὸ φῶς τὸ ἀληθινὸν ἤδη "φαίνει. 
1Cor. vii-g, 76 λέγων ἐν τῷ φωτὶ εἶναι, καὶ τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ μισῶν, ἐν τῇ 


: a A a Ν 
w John i. ο. σκοτίᾳ ἐστὶν ἕως ἄρτι. 10. 76 ἀγαπῶν τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ, ἐν τῷ φωτὶ 


x Johni. 5, 
ν. 3535 
Rev. i. 16, 
viii. 12, 
XViii. 23, 
Xxi. 23. 

y iv. 20. 

Zi. 5-7; Ps. xxxvi. 9. 

Ὁ John iii. 8, viii. 14, xii. 35, xiii. 36, xiv. 5, Xvi. 5. 
xii. 40). 


A ~ a “- 
μένει, καὶ " σκάνδαλον ἐν αὐτῷ οὐκ ἔστιν τι. ὁ δὲ μισῶν τὸν 
25 λ Q > a bo. a , > , ἮΝ τ a” , “ a 
ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ, " ἐν TH σκοτίᾳ ἐστί, καὶ ἐν TH σκοτίᾳ περιπατεῖ, καὶ 

col , ~ 
οὐκ οἶδε “ ποῦ ὑπάγει, ὅτι ἡ σκοτία ἐτύφλωσε TOUS ὀφθαλμοὺς αὐτοῦ. 


a Johann. only here and Rev. ii. 14; σκανδαλίζειν John vi. 61, xvi. I. 


c John xi. 9, 10, xiv. 35, 36; Is. vi. τὸ (John 


lev avtw ουκ ἐστιν BKLP, WH, Nest.; οὐκ ἐστιν ev αὐτω SAC, Tisch., WH 


(marg). 


necessity of Love. This truth, though 
unperceived, is contained in the revela- 
tion of Jesus Christ (ἐν αὐτῷ) and proved 
in the experience of believers (ἐν ὑμῖν). 
It is a fact that hatred of one’s brother 
clouds the soul and shuts out the light. 
“1 know this,” says the Apostle, ‘‘ be- 
cause the darkness is passing away and 
the light, the true light, is already shin- 
ing,” 2.6. my eyes are getting accustomed 
to the light of the Gospel-revelation, 
and I have seen this truth which at first 
was hidden from me. Adjectives in 
τινός denote the material of which the 
thing is made; and ἀληθινός is used of 
the real as opposed either to the type 
(cf. John vi. 32, xv. 1; Heb. viii. 2, ix. 
24) or to the counterfeit (cf. Symb. Nic. : 
Θεὸν ἀληθινὸν ἐκ Θεοῦ ἀληθινοῦ “ very 
God of very God,” i.e. the real God as 
opposed to false gods, idols, which were 
“things of naught”). The opposite of 
τὸ φῶς τὸ ἀληθινόν is, on the one hand, 
the dim light of the Jewish Law (the 
type) and, on the other, the false light of 
human speculation (the counterfeit). 

Ver. 9. He says and perhaps thinks 
he is in the light, but he has never seen 
the light; it has never shone on him. 
ἀδελφόν, on the lips of Jesus a fellow- 
man (cf. Matt. v. 45; Luke xv. 30, 32), 
in the apostolic writings a fellow-Chris- 
tian (cf. v. I-2, 16)—one of the apostolic 
narrowings of the Lord’s teaching. Cf. 
‘‘neighbour ”—with the Rabbis, a fellow- 
Jew; with Jesus, a fellow-man (cf. Luke 
x. 25-37). There is no contradiction be- 
tween this passage and Luke xiv. 26. 
The best commentary on the latter is 
John xii. 25. 

Ver. το. ἐν τῷ φωτὶ μένει : he does 
not merely catch glimpses of the light 
but ‘‘abideth in it,” being of one mind 
with God, the common Father, who ‘‘is 
light” (i. 5). σκάνδαλον οὐκ ἔστιν ἐν 
αὐτῷ, ‘ there is no occasion of stumbling, 
nothing to trip him up and make him 
fall, in his case ”—an echo of John xi. 
9,10. Another interpretation, less agree- 
able to the context but more consonant 


with the common use of σκάνδαλον (cf. 
Matt. xiii. 41, xviii. 7; Rom. xiv. 13), is: 
Because he is winsome and gracious, 
there is in him no stumbling-block to 
others, nothing to deter them from 
accepting the Gospel. The love of 
the primitive Christians impressed the 
heathen. Cf. Tert. Apol. 39: “ Vide, 
inquiunt, ut invicem se diligant: ipsi 
enim invicem oderunt ; et ut pro alterutro 
mori sint parati: ipsi enim ad occidendum 
alterutrum paratiores erunt”. Ep. ad 
Diogn. 1: καὶ τίνα φιλοστοργίαν ἔχ- 
ovat πρὸς ἀλλήλους. This spirit disap- 
peared, and in view of the bitter contro- 
versies of the 4th century the Pagan 
historian Ammianus avowed that ‘the 
enmity of the Christians toward each 
other surpassed the fury of savage beasts 
against man”. Another interpretation 
takes αὐτῷ as neuter: ‘“‘ There is no 
occasion of stumbling in it,” z.e., in the 
light. Cf. John xi. 9. 

Ver. τι. St. John recognises no neutral 
attitude between ‘‘love” and “hatred”. 
Love is active benevolence, and less than 
this is hatred, just as indifference to the 
Gospel-call amounts to rejection of it (cf. 
Matt. xxii. 5-7). Observetheclimax: ‘in 
the darkness is, and in the darkness 
walketh, and knoweth not where he is 
going”. ἐτύφλωσεν, aor. of the inde- 
finite past, where we would use the perf. 
(cf. Moulton, Gram. of N. T. Gk., i. pp. 
135 ff.). The penalty of living in the 
darkness is not merely that one does not 
see, but that one goes blind. The neg- 
lected faculty isatrophied. Cf. the mole, 
the crustacea in the subterranean lakes 
of the Mammoth Caves of Kentucky. 

Observe how St. John emphasises and 
elaborates the old-new commandment 
“Love thy brother,” reiterating it, put- 
ting it negatively and positively. 

Vv. 12-17. The Appeal of Experience, 
“T am writing to you, little children, be- 
cause your sins have been forgiven you 
for His name’s sake; I am writing to 
you, fathers, because ye fave got to 
know Him that it is from the beginning 


g—14. 


a a , 
12. γράφω ὑμῖν, τεκνία, ὅτι ἀφέωνται ὑμῖν at ἁμαρτίαι 


ὄνομα αὐτοῦ. 
ἀρχῆς. 


γράφω ὑμῖν, ᾿ νεανίσκοι, ὅτι 


IQANOY A 


13. Γράφω ὑμῖν, πατέρες, ὅτι ἐγνώκατε τὸν " ἀπ᾽ 


h 
® νενικήκατε 


177 


ἀ διὰ τὸ“ Matt. x 
22, XXiv. 
9; John 
XV. 21 


1 , Rev. ii. 3. 
πο OV. 3 
"ΠΡ ΘΙΟΙ 


nN 
TOV 


γράφω 3 ὑμῖν, ' παιδία, ὅτι ἐγνώκατε τὸν πατέρα. 14. Ἔγραψα ὑμῖν, f Matt. xix. 


20, 22 


πατέρες, ὅτι ἐγνώκατε τὸν ὃ ἀπ᾿ ἀρχῆς. Ἔγραψα ὑμῖν, νεανίσκοι, ὅτι Acts, ii. 


ἰσχυροί ἐστε, καὶ ' ὁ λόγος τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐν ὑμῖν μένει, 


ν , 4 17. 5 
καὶ νενικήκατε τὸν g John xvi. 


33; Rom. 
xii. 21. h iii. 12, v. 18, 19; John xvii. 15; Matt. v. 37, vi. 13, xili. 19, 38. i Ver. 18, 
iii. 17 (ν.1.). k Eph. vi. ro. li. 10 reff. 
το NY. 
2 ypadw K, Vg., Aug.; eypaiya SSABCLP, Syrve ph, Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., 
edd. 
3 ro B. 


I am writing to you, young men, because 
ye have conquered the Evil One. I 
wrote to you, little ones, because ye 
have got to know the Father; I wrote 
to you, fathers, because ye have got to 
know Him that is from the beginning; I 
wrote to you, young men, because ye 
are strong, and the Word of God abideth 
in you, and ye have conquered the Evil 
One. Love not the world, nor the things 
that are in the world. If any one loveth 
the world, the love of the Father is not 
in him; because everything that is in 
the world—the lust of the flesh, and the 
lust of the eyes, and the braggart boast 
of life—is not of the Father but is of the 
world. And the world is passing away 
and the lust of it, but he that doeth the 
will of God abideth for ever.” 

The Apostle has been setting forth 
searching truths and is about to make 
an exacting claim; and here he pauses 
and with much tenderness reassures his 
readers: “I am not addressing you as 
unbelievers or casting doubt upon the 
sincerity of your faith. On the con- 
trary, it is because I am assured thereof 
that I am writing this letter to you and 
wrote the Gospel which accompanies it”’. 

Ver. 12. τεκνία, all the Apostle’s 
readers, his customary appellation (see 
n. on ii. τ). ἀφέωνται, perf., the Doric 
form of ἀφεῖνται. τὸ ὄνομα αὐτοῦ, the 
character, mind, purpose of God revealed 
in Christ. ‘‘The name of God” is 
‘whatsoever there is whereby he makes 
himself known” (Westm. Larg. Catech.). 

Ver. 13. He now subdivides texvia 
into πατέρες, i.e., mature believers with 
a long and ever-deepening (ἐγνώκατε) 
experience behind them, and νεανίσκοι, 
who, though 4 ἐπιθυμία τῆς σαρκός is 
strong within them, have conquered the 
Evil One by the aids of grace—an evid- 
ence of the reality of their interest in 
Christ. dm ἀρχῆς. as in i. τ. The 
ancient interpreters took τεκνία, πατέρες, 


γεανίσκοι as a threefold classification, 
according to age (Aug., Athan.) or ac- 
cording to Christian experience, κατὰ 
τὸν ἔσω ἄνθρωπον (Euth. Zig.); but the 
order would then be either τεκνία, vea- 
νίσκοι, πατέρες OF πατέρες, νεανίσκοι, 
τεκνία. According to the variant γράφω 
ὑμῖν, παιδία, τεκνία is a general appella- 
tion subdivided into πατέρες, νεανίσκοι, 
παιδία. Ver. 14 should begin with 
ἔγραψα ὑμῖν, παιδία. [πε aor. ἔγραψα 
is most simply and reaSonably explained 
as a reference to the Apostle’s Gospel 
(see Introd. p. 154). Having assured them 
of his present conviction of the sincerity 
of their faith, he now goes on to assure 
them that he had entertained a like 
opinion when he wrote the Gospel for 
their instruction. His tone is much like 
that of 2 Pet.i.12. Other explanations: 
(1) The reference is to a former epistle 
(cf. 3 John g)—a gratuitous and un- 
necessary hypothesis. (2) The Apostle 
resumes after a pause whether in com- 
position or in thought, and reiterates 
what he “has written”. (3) An em- 
phatic form of expression, like “we 
decree and have decreed”. (4) Calvin, 
reading γράφω ὑμῖν, παιδία, regards 
πατέρες . . . πονηρόν as an interpola- 
tion. This is to cut the knot instead of 
untying it. παιδία, a general appella- 
tion for all the Apostle’s readers, prac- 
tically identical with τεκνία. Strictly 
τεκνία Carries the idea of relationship by 
birth-regeneration ; cf. Aug.: ‘‘Quia re- 
mittuntur vobis peccata per nomen ejus, 
et regeneramini in novam vitam, ideo 
filii”., παιδία, on the other hand, are 
merely ‘‘children,” wert (Aug.), infantes 
(Vulg.), and the distinction is ὅτι 
ἐγνώκατε tov Πατέρα. All men are 
children of God, believers are children 
who “ have got to know the Father 
Ver. 14. The Apostle gives the same 
reason as before for writing to the 
fathers, as though there could be none 


178 


m James iv. . 
πο OV. 
i vp 


n Rom. xiii. τις ἀγαπᾷ τὸν κόσμον, οὐκ ἔστιν ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ πατρὸς ᾿ ἐν αὐτῷ - 

6. ὅτι πᾶν τὸ ἐν τῷ κό π ἢ ἐπιθυμία τῆς σαρκός, καὶ ἡ ἐπιθυμία 
16. ὅτι πᾶν τὸ ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ, "4 ἐπιθυμία τῆς σαρκός, καὶ ἢ μ 
a , An , 

τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν, καὶ ἡ " ἀλαζονεία * τοῦ PBlou, οὐκ ἔστιν ἐκ τοῦ πατρός, 


14; Gal. 
v. 16, 24; 
Eph. ii. 3; 


aici 2 Ἢ 
2 Ῥειεσ ϊ. ἀλλ᾽ 5. « ἐκ τοῦ κόσμου ἐστί. 
10, 18; 


1QANOY A 


Il. 


~ ~ , 
15. μὴ ἀγαπᾶτε τὸν κόσμον, μηδὲ τὰ ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ - "' ἐάν 


- 


Te s a -€ 
I7.- και Oo κόσμος * TAapayeTat, και ἢ 


A nw a A“ > a fA 
2 Peter ii.€muBupia αὐτοῦ" ὃ δὲ " ποιῶν τὸ θέλημα τοῦ Θεοῦ, μένει εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα. 


14; Mark 
iv. 19. 


4 iv. 5; John viil. 23, xv. 19. r Ver. 8 reff. 


o James iv. 16; Rom. i. 30; 2 Tim. ili. 2 (ἀλαζών). 3 
s John iv. 34; Matt. vii. 21, xxiv. 39; 1 Peter iv. 2. 


p Luke viii. 14; 2 Tim. ii. 4 


lov matpos SBKLP, Syrvg ph, Vg., Cop., Sah., Arm., Aug., edd.; tov θεου AC, 
several minusc., Aeth.; tov θεου και πατρος, several minusc. 


2 ahalovera BK ; αλαζονία SAB*LP, edd. 


greater. He gives the same reason also 
for writing to the young men, but he 
amplifies it: they have the strength of 
youth, but it is disciplined by the in- 
dwelling Word, and therefore they have 
conquered. 

Ver. 15. He is dealing with believers 
who have a large experience of the 
grace of Christ, and on this fact he pro- 
ceeds to base an appeal, a call to further 
advancement and higher attainment: 
‘“‘ Love not the world”. Yet God “loved 
the world” (John iii. 16). Observe that 
the Apostle does not say that the world 
is evil. It is God’s world, and ‘‘ God 
saw every thing that He had made, and, 
behold, it was very good” (Gen. i. 31). 
His meaning is: ‘The things in the 
world are transient. Do not set your 
affection on them, else you will sustain 
a bitter disappointment. The world isa 
good and beautiful gift of God, to be 
used with joy and gratitude; but it is 
not the supreme end, it is not the home 
of oursouls”. ‘Let the Spirit of God 
be in thee,” says St. Augustine, ‘‘ that 
thou mayest see that all these things 
are good; but woe to thee if thou love 
created things and forsake the Creator! 
. . . Ifa bridegroom made a ring for his 
bride and, when she got it, she were 
fonder of the ring than of the bridegroom 
who made the ring for her, would not an 
adulterous spirit be detected in the very 
gift of the bridegroom, however she 
might love what the bridegroom gave? 
. . .God gave thee all those things: 
love Him who made them. There is 
more which He would fain give thee, 
to wit, Himself who made these things ”. 
Again: ‘ There are two loves—of the 
world and of God. If the love of the 
world inhabit, there is no way for the 
love of God to enter. Let the love of 
the world retire and that of God inhabit, 
let the better get room. . . . Shut out 
the evil love of the world, that thou 
mayest be filled by the love of God. 


3 αλλ NAKL; adda BC, edd. 


Thou art a vessel, but thou art still full ; 
pour out what thou hast, that thou 
mayest get what thou hast not”. ἥ 
ἀγάπη τοῦ Πατρός, like ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ 
Θεοῦ (ver. 5), either (1) “love for the 
Father,” in antithesis to ἀγαπᾷ τὸν 
κόσμον, or (2) “the love which the 
Father feels for us”. In fact the one 
implies the other. The sense of the 
Father’s love for us awakens in us an 
answering love for Him. Cf. iv. 19. 

Ver. 16. ἡ ἐπιθυμία τῆς σαρκός, not 
object. gen. (Aug.: ‘‘desideri'um earum 
rerum quz pertinent ad carnem, sicut 
cibus et concubitus, et cetera hujus- 
modi,”) but subject.: “the lust which 
the flesh feels, which resides in the flesh”. 
Cf. ἣ ἐπιθυμία τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν. ἀλαζονία, 
vain pretension, claiming what one really 
hasnot. Def. Plat.: ἕξις προσποιητικὴ 
ἀγαθοῦ ἢ ἀγαθῶν τῶν μὴ ὑπαρχόντων. 
Suid.: ἀλαζόνας τοὺς ψεύστας ἐκάλουν, 
ἐπεὶ λέγειν ἐπαγγέλλονται περὶ ὧν μὴ 
ἴσασιν. Theophr. Char. vi. : προσδοκία 
τις ἀγαθῶν οὐκ ὄντων. ζωή, the vital 
principle (vita qua vivimus), βίος, the 
outward life (vita quam vivimus) or live- 
lihood (victus). There is here a sum- 
mary of all possible sins, exemplified in 
the temptations of Eve (Gen. iii. 1-6) 
and our Lord (Matt. iv. 1-11). Cf. Aug.; 
Lightfoot, Hor. Heb., on Matt. iv. 1. 
(1) ‘‘ The lust of the flesh”: cf. ‘‘ The 
tree was good for food”; “Command that 
these stones become loaves”. (2) ‘‘ The 
lust of the eyes”: cf. “It wasa delight 
to the eyes”; “Cast thyself down ”—a 
spectacular display. (3) ‘“‘ The braggart 
boast of life”: cf. ‘* The tree was to be 
desired to make one wise”: “ All the 
kingdoms of the world and the glory of 
them”. 

Ver. 17. An explanation, especially 
of ἡ ἀλαζονία τοῦ βίου. To set one’s 
affection on the things in the world is 
‘‘braggart boasting”; for they are not 
ours, they are transient. Cf. Moham- 
med: ‘* What have I to do with the 


as IQANOY A 179 
t , ΠῚ , “ 2 Lae Ν δ τὰ f ~ 1é2x _t Ver. 13 
18. ‘Nadia, " ἐσχάτη " ὥρα ἐστι" καὶ καθὼς " ἠκούσατε OTL ὁ “ * ἀν ΕΣ 
, ~ 4 , 7 "Ἴ 
τίχριστος ” ἔρχεται, καὶ νῦν ἀντίχριστοι πολλοὶ γεγόνασιν - * ὅθεν " ] ΡΝ, 
54, Xi. 24; Acts ii. 17; 1 Cor. xv. 52; 2 Tim. iii. 1; James ν. 1; 1 Peter i. 5; 2 Peter iii. 3. 
w John v. 28. w Matt. xxiv. 5, 24. x Ver. 22, iv. 3; 3 John 7. y John iv. 25. z Acts xxvl. 


19; Heb. ii. 17, iii. 1, vii. 25, 1x. 18. 


1 ort Ὁ ΒΟΚΡ, Syrve ph, Vg., Cop., Aug., edd. ; 
20 NcAKL ; om. δ ΒΟ, Arm., edd. 


comforts of this life? The world and I 
—what connection is there between us ? 
Verily the world is no otherwise than as 
a tree unto me: when the traveller hath 
rested under its shade, he passeth on.” 
Aug. on iv. 4: ‘Mundus iste omnibus 
fidelibus quzrentibus. patriam sic est, 
quomodo fuit eremus populo Israel”. 
αὐτοῦ, subjective genitive like σαρκός 
and ὀφθαλμῶν. τὸ θέλημα τοῦ Θεοῦ, 
alone permanent amid the flux of tran- 
sitory things. Cf. Aug.: ‘‘ Rerum tem- 
poralium fluvius trahit: sed tanquam 
circa fluvium arbor nata est Dominus 
noster Jesus Christus. Assumpsit car- 
nem, mortuus est, resurrexit, ascendit in 
celum. Voluit se quodammodo circa 
fluvium temporalium plantare. Raperis 
in praeceps? tene lignum. Volvit te 
amor mundi? tene Christum.” 

Vv. 18-29. A Warning against Here- 
tical Teaching. ‘‘ Little ones, it is the 
last hour; and, as ye heard that Anti- 
christ is coming, even now have many 
antichrists arisen; whence we recognise 
that it is the last hour. From our com- 
pany they went out, but they were not of 
our company; for. if they had been of 
our company, they would have abode in 
our fellowship; but the purpose of it was 
that it may be manifested that they all 
are not of ourcompany. And ye havea 
chrism from the Holy One, and ye all 
know. I did not write to you because 
ye did not know the Truth, but because 
ye know it and because every lie is not 
of the Truth. Who is the liar but he 
that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? 
This is the Antichrist—he that denieth 
the Father and the Son. Every one 
that denieth the Son neither hath he the 
Father; he that confesseth the Son hath 
the Father also. As for you, that which 
ye heard from the beginning, let it abide 
in you. If that abide in you which ye 
heard from the beginning, ye also in the 
Son and in the Father will abide. And 
this is the promise which He Himself 
promised us—the Life, the Eternal Life. 
These things I wrote to you regarding 
them that would lead you astray. And 
as for you, the chrism which ye received 
from Him abideth in you, and ye have 
no need that any one should teach you; 
but, as His chrism is teaching you re- 


om. AL, several minusc. 


garding all things, and is true and is not 
a lie, and even as it taught you, abide 
in Him. And now, little children, abide 
in Him, that, if He be manifested, we 
may have boldness and not be shamed 
away from Him at His advent. If 
ve know that He is righteous, recog- 
nise that every one also that doeth 
righteousness hath been begotten of 
Him.” 

A heresy had arisen in the bosom of 
the Church (see Introd. pp. 156 f.). It was 
a fatal heresy, a denial of the possibility 
of the Incarnation, and therefore of the 
relation of fatherhood and sonship be- 
tween God and man. St. John’s empha- 
tic condemnation of it was justified, but 
his apprehension was groundless. He 
shared the prevailing expectation of the 
imminence of the Second Advent (cf. 
t Cor. x. 11, xv. 51; Phil. iv. 5; 1 Thess. 
iv. 15 sqq.; Heb. x. 25; James v. 8; τ 
Peter iv. 7; Rev. i. 1, 3, iii, 12, xxii. 7, 
10, 12, 20), and saw in the heresy an 
evidence that the end was at hand. It 
was rather an evidence that the Gospel 
was winning its way. The era of simple 
and unquestioning faith in the apostolic 
testimony was past, and men were be- 
ginning to enquire and reason. A heresy 
has the same use in theology as a mis- 
taken hypothesis in science: it provokes 
thought and leads to a deeper under- 
standing. What seemed to the Apostle 
the pangs of dissolution were in reality 
“ growing pains”. 

Ver. 18. Aug.: ‘“ Pueros alloquitur, ut 
festinent crescere, quia novissima hora 
est. . . . Proficite, currite, crescite, no- 
vissima hora est”. Ver. 28 puts it be- 
yond doubt that ἐσχάτη ὥρα means “ the 
end of the world,” and rules out various 
attempts which have been made to give 
it another reference and absolve the 
Apostle from the current misconception : 
(1) Aug. says vaguely: ‘the last hour is 
of long duration, yet it is the last” (novts- 
sima hora diuturna est ; tamen novissima 
est). And Calv.: ‘‘ Nothing any longer 
remains but that Christ should appear 
for the redemption of the world... . 
He calls that ‘ the last time’ in which all 
things are being so completed that no- 
thing is left except the last revelation of 
Christ”. (2) Lightfoot, Hor. Heb., on 


180 IQANOY A 
a Acts xv. γινώσκομεν ὅτι ἐσχάτη ὥρα ἐστίν. 


ue 


19. " Ἐξ ἡμῶν ἐξῆλθον, ἀλλ᾽ 


Ὁ John iit. οὐκ ἦσαν " ἐξ ἡμῶν " εἰ γὰρ ἦσαν ἐξ ἡμῶν," μεμενήκεισαν ἂν “μεθ᾽ ἡμῶν - 


ς Matt.i. ἀλλ᾽ ἃ ἵνα ° φανερωθῶσιν ὅτι οὐκ εἰσὶ πάντες ἐξ ἡμῶν. 


23, XXVi. 


69; Acts 
i.26. d1Cor xi. 19. 


1 εξηλθον SSKLP; εξηλθαν ABC, edd. 
Ἢ δ ul 


e John iii. 21 ; 2 Cor. iii. 3. 


20. Kal ὑμεῖς 


29, 38, 58,‘ χρίσμα 3 ἔχετε ἀπὸ = τοῦ ἁγίου, καὶ " οἴδατε πάντα.Ζ 21. οὐκ ἔγραψα 


f Ver.27. gCf.Comm. 81 Cor. ii. 15.. 


2ησαν εξ ἡμων SAKLP, Tisch. ; εξ μων noav BC, WH, Nest. 
8 χρίσμα WH; χρῖσμα Tisch., Nest. ; cf v. 27. 
4@avta ACKL, Syrvg (understanding πάντα ἄνθρωπον) ph, Vg., Cop., Aeth., 


Arm. ; παντες ἡ ΒΡ, Sah., edd. 


John xxi. 22, compares O17 TTS 
i.e., ‘the last times of the Jewish city, 
nation, and dispensation,” and remarks: 
“Gens ista vergit jam quam proxime in 
ruinam, cum enatus jam sit ultimus et 
summus apex infidelitatis, apostasize et 
nequitie”. (3) Beng. with unwonted in- 
eptitude: The advanced age of St. John 
and his contemporaries in contrast to his 
‘little children”. ‘‘Ultima, non respectu 
omnium mundi temporum: sed in anti- 
theto puerulorum ad patres, et ad juve- 
nes”. (4) Westcott: ‘‘a last hour,” i.e., 
‘a period of critical change”. This is 
possible but improbable. The omission 
of the def. art. in the pred. is regular. 
᾿Αντίχριστος (anarthrous) is a proper 
name. Nowhere in N.T. but in the Jo- 
hannine Epp. It may mean (1), on the 
analogy of ἀντιφιλόσοφος, ἀντικάτων, 
ἀντικείμενος, ἀντίθεσις, “adversary of 
Christ,”’ Widerchrist (Luth.); cf. Orig. 
C. Cels. vi. 45: τὸν τούτῳ κατὰ διάμετ- 
pov ἐναντίον, Tert. De Praescript. Her.: 
ἐς antichristi, Christi rebelles,’ Aug.: 
“‘Latine Antichristus contrarius est 
Christo”; (2), on the analogy of ἄντι- 
βασιλεύς, ἀνθύπατος (proconsul), ‘ anti- 
pope,” a ‘“‘rival of Christ,” usurping His 
name, a Ψευδόχριστος (cf. Matt. xxiv. 24 
= Mark xiii. 22); cf. Aristoph. Eq. 1038 
sq.: ἐγὼ yap ἀντὶ τοῦ λέοντός εἰμί σοι. 
Ι καὶ πῶς μ᾽ ἐλελήθης ᾿Αντιλέων γεγεν- 
npevos; St. John seems to combine both 
ideas. The heresy arose in the bosom 
of the Church and claimed to bean en- 
lightened Christianity ; yet, while calling 
themselves Christians, Cerinthus and his 
followers were adversaries of Christ. 
Wetst. : ‘‘ Qui se pro Christo gerit, ideoque 
ei contrarius est”. ἀντίχριστοι πολλοί, 
the exponents and representatives of the 
antichristian movement were a numerous 
party. γεγόνασιν, ‘‘have arisen,” in 
contrast to the true Christ who ‘“ was in 
the beginning”. Cf. the contrast between 
the Word and the Baptist in John i. 1, 6. 

Ver. 19. Cf. Aug.: ‘‘Sic sunt in cor- 


pore Christi quomodo humores mali. 
Quando evomuntur, tunc relevatur corpus : 
sic et mali quando exeunt, tune Ecclesia 
relevatur. Et dicit quando eos evomit 
atque projicit corpus: Ex me exierunt 
umores isti, sed non erant ex me. Quid 
est, non erant ex me?’ Non de carne 
mea precisi sunt, sed pectus mihi preme- 
bant cum inessent”. ἵνα, sc. ἐξῆλθαν 
or γέγονε τοῦτο---ἃ frequent Johannine 
ellipse: of. John i. 8, ix. 3, xili. 18, 
XV. 25. 

Ver. 20. An expression of confidence 
in his readers: they will not be led 
astray; they have received ‘‘a chrism,” 
the enlightening grace of the Holy Spirit, 
‘‘which He poured forth upon us richly 
through Jesus Christ our Saviour”’ (Tit. 
iii. 6). Baptism was called χρῖσμα in 
later days (Greg. Naz. Orvat. xl. 4) be- 
cause of the r-te of baptismal] anointing 
(cf. Tert. De Bapt. 7: “ Exinde egressi 
de lavacro perungimur benedicta unctione 
de pristina disciplina, qua ungi oleo de 
cornu in sacerdotium solebant”; Aug.: 
““Unctio spiritalis ipse Spiritus sanctus 
est, cujus sacramentum est in unctione 
visibili”); but there is no reference here 
to this rite, which was of a later date and 
was derived from our passage. χρῖσμα is 
suggested by ἀντίχριστοι. ‘They are 
ἀντίχριστοι, you are χριστοί." Cf. 
Ps. cv. (civ. LXX) 15: μὴ ἅψησθε τῶν 
χριστῶν pov. τοῦ ‘Aylov, not the Holy 
Spirit. St. John has τὸ Πνεῦμα in Epp. 
and Rey., but never τὸ Πνεῦμα τὸ ἽΑγιον. 
Either (1) Christ (cf Rey. iii. 7) or (2) 
God the Father (cf. Acts x. 38; Heb. 
i.g). The latter is preferable. The Spirit 
παρὰ τοῦ Πατρὸς ἐκπορεύεται (John xv. 
26)—from (ἀπό) the Father through (81a). 
Christ (cf. Tit. tii. 6). 

Ver. 21. ἔγραψα, “1 wrote,” may refer 
to the Gospel, which is an exposition of 
the Incarnation, ἡ τοῦ Σωτῆρος ἡμῶν 
Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ ἔνσαρκος οἰκονομία (7. 
note on ver. 14) ; but more probably ‘‘ aor. 
referring to the moment just past” (Jebb 
on Soph. O.T. 337). The aor. is appro- 


19—27. 


IQANOY A 


181 


ὑμῖν, ' ὅτι οὐκ οἴδατε τὴν ἀλήθειαν, ἀλλ᾽ ὅτι οἴδατε αὐτήν, καὶ ὅτι hem 


πᾶν ψεῦδος " ἐκ τῆς ἀληθείας οὐκ ἔστι. 
εἰ μὴ ὃ ἀρνούμενος ὅτι Ἰησοῦς τ' οὐκ ἔστιν ὁ Χριστός ; οὗτός ἐστιν 


ἀντίχριστος, ὁ ἀρνούμενος τὸν πατέρα 


ἀρνούμενος τὸν υἱόν, οὐδὲ τὸν πατέρα ἔχει.3 
> , CE ΑΚ. lol > | , 
ἠκούσατε " ἀπ᾿ ἀρχῆς, ἐν ὑμῖν μενέτω. 
A > , Pp ne a 3 - εκ τ ΟΝ lal ‘ a 
ἀρχῆς ἠκούσατε, ἢ καὶ ὑμεῖς ἐν TO υἱῷ Kal ἐν TH πατρὶ μενεῖτε. 7. 25. 
ν᾿ ΠῚ > Marae λί a see > ὮΝ εκ κ᾿ 
25. καὶ αὕτη ἐστὶν “ ἣ ἐπαγγελία, ἣν αὐτὸς ἐπηγγείλατο ἡμῖν, τὴν 


1 


22. Tis ἐστιν 6! ψεύστης, tie 16. 
6 m Luke xx. 
27; Gal. 
, 
καὶ τὸν υἱόν. 23. ἢ πᾶς 
[ a 2.3 
2 . υ 
ΠῚ aes oar 23, XV. 23. 
o Ver. 7. 
p John xv. 


ke 


XXiv. 49; 
‘ x 27 A » ea ‘ A , Acts i. 43 
ζωὴν τὴν αἰώνιον. 26. ταῦτα ἔγραψα ὑμῖν περὶ τῶν πλανώντων τ Tim.iv. 
wee Sie a x , 42 2 » 3 3 a > εν 8; 2 Tim. 
ὑμᾶς. 27- Και ὕμεις τὸ χρίσμα" ὁ ἐλάβετε απ αὕτου, ἐν μι Nea 
΄ 5 ΟΕ , oo o διδά eA «ἀλλ᾽ ὦ ἀπ ΟΣ 7 Heb. iv. 1. 
μένει, και οὐ χρειαν εχετε Wa τις OL ασκῃ υμας ὡς “το aUTO τι. 8 reff. 
a s Heb. v. 12. 
χρίσμα 8 διδάσκει ὑμᾶς περὶ πάντων, καὶ ἀληθές ἐστι, καὶ οὐκ ἔστι t John 
Xiv. 26: 


leo edd. 


xvi. 13; Gal. i. 12; Heb. viii. 11 (Jer. xxxi. 34) 


3 Add 6 ὁμολογῶν τὸν υἱὸν καὶ τὸν π᾿αατέρα exe. SABCP, many minusc., Syrvg ph. 


Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., Aug., edd. 


ϑουν om. $,ABCP, Syrph, Vg., Arm., edd. 
5 pever ev υμιν SSABCP, Vg., Cop., Sah. 


Sad ws to MACKLP, Vg., Sah., edd. ; 


4yaptopa B. 


, Aeth., Arm., edd. 


αλλα το B, Aeth. 


‘auto AKL, Cop. ; αὐτου  ΒΟΡ, Syrvg ph, Vg., Sah., Aeth., Arm., Aug., edd. 


Sarveupa δ", Cop., Aeth. 


priate. No sooner has he spoken of the 
antichrists than he hastens to reiterate 
his assurance of confidence in his readers. 
τὴν ἀλήθειαν, see note oni. 8. ἐκ, of 
parentage (cf. iii. 8-10). His readers had 
only to be reminded of their experience 
(οἴδατε), and it would keep them from 
being led astray. An experience is an 
anchor to the soul in time of storm. 
“Tell me,” said the dying Cromwell to a 
minister, ‘‘is it possible to fall from 
grace?” . ‘No, it is not possible.” 
“Then I am safe, for I know that I was 
once in grace” (Morley’s Oliver Crom- 
well, V. x.). 

Ver. 22. ψεύστης; cf. n.oni. 6. The 


the Father; through Him we reach the 
Unseen Father (cf. John xiv. 9). 

Ver. 25. ἐπαγγελία, repromissio, ‘ pro-- 
mise”; only here in the Johannine writ- 
ings (see note oni. 5). αὐτός, i.¢., the: 
Father. God is the Promiser, and His. 
promises are made in Christ (cf. 2 Cor. 
i. 20). 

Ver. 26. ἔγραψα, see note on ver. 21. 
τῶν πλανώντων, the heretical teachers. 
Pres. partic., ‘‘are leading astray” but 
unsuccessfully. 

Ver. 27. The ground of the Apostle’s 
confidence in his readers. They need 
not be taught but only reminded. ἀλλ᾽ 
ὡς, «.T.A., a single sentence with one 


Cerinthian distinction between Jesus and _apodosis, WVulg. makes it a double sen- 


the Christ was a denial of the possibility” ten 


of the Incarnation, z.e., of the filial rela- 
tion of man to God. ov« in dependent 
clause after ἀρνεῖσθαι is a common Gk. 
idiom, not unknown in English; cf. 
Shakespeare, Comedy of Errors, tv. ii. 7: 
“ He denied you had-in him no right”. 

Ver. 23. Since the Father is manifested 
and interpreted in the Son. Cf. Johni. 
ἘΠῚ xiv. 9. 

Ver. 24. ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς, as in ver. 7. The 
significant iteration of μένειν is lost in 
A.V. (‘abide ... remain... continue”). 
ἐν τῷ Υἱῷ καὶ ἐν τῷ Πατρί: observe the 
order. The Son is the manifestation of 


MOT: | Ve ἘΔ 


ith-two apodoses: ‘‘as His chrism 
is teaching you regarding all things, it is 
indeed true and is not a lie; and even as 
it taught you, abide in Him”. Reading 
ἀλλά, translate: ‘‘ ye have no need that 
any one should teach you, but His chrism 
is teaching you ... a lie; and even as, 
etc.” διδάσκει, of the continued teach- 
ing by the grace of the Spirit; ἐδίδαξεν, 
of the illumination at the hour of con- 
version. μένετε, plainly imperat. in next 
ver., can hardly be indicat. here (“‘ ye are 
abiding”). The reading μενεῖτε (‘‘ye 
shall abide”) would express the Apostle’s: 
confidence in the steadfastness of his 


182 


u John xvii. 
5. 

vi.2; John 

1; 3, ΣΕ, 

Ὧν αν 

Col. iii. 4; 


IQANOY A 
ψεῦδος - καὶ καθὼς ἐδίδαξεν ὑμᾶς, μενεῖτε i 


Kat δ eee 96 ye] 3 “ > ~ y , > A 
μὴ " αἰσχυνθῶμεν aT αὑτοῦ, ἐν TH ” παρουσίᾳ αὐτοῦ. 


II, 28---29. III. 


ἐν αὐτῷ. 28. “Kat νῦν, 


id Ψ' 3 ΓΕ ὙΠ τ᾿ 2¥ θῇ 5» ὃνπ ΄ 
TEKVLO, μένετε EV AUTH * ινὰ οταν pavepw No ἔχωμεν παρρησιαν, 


20. ν ἐὰν 


1 Peter v. εἰδῆτε ὅτι δίκαιός ἐστι, " γινώσκετε ὅτι * πᾶς ὁ ποιῶν τὴν δικαιοσύνην, 


w 111. 21, ἵν, ἐξ αὐτοῦ γεγέννηται. 
17, ν. 145 ξ rar 
Eph. iii. ΠῚ 


I. Ἴδετε 
12; Heb. 


ποταπὴν ἀγάπην δέδωκεν ὅ ἡμῖν ὃ πατήρ, ἵνα 


ἵν. 16, χ. τέκνα Θεοῦ ἢ κληθῶμεν ὅ - διὰ τοῦτο ὁ κόσμος οὐ γινώσκει ἡμᾶς, ὅτι 


19. 
x Mark viii. 38; Rev. iii. 18. 
z Phil. ii, 1. a John xv. 18. 


y Matt. xxiv. 3, 27, 39; 1 Cor xv. 23; 1 Thess. ii. 19; iii. 13. 
a Matt. viii. 27; Mark xiii. 1; Luke i. 29, vii. 39; 2 Peter iil. 11. 


Matt. v. 9, xxiii. 7, 8, 9, xxvii. 8; Luke i. 32, 35; Johni. 43. 


1pevere KL; pevere SABCP, many minusc., Syrvg ph, Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., 


-Arm., Aug., edd. 


2 orav KL, Syrvg ph, Vg., Aug.; eav SSABCP, Cop., Sah., Arm., edd. 


5 exopev NQ*KL ; σχωμεν NCBCP, edd. 


407. BKL, Syrph, Cop., Aeth., Arm., Aug., WH; ore καὶ SQACP, Syrve, Vg., 


‘Sah., Tisch., Nest. 
5 Se8wxev SMABCKP, edd. ; eSwxev AL. 


edd 


readers, like ‘‘ England expects every 
man to do his duty”. Cf. Matt. v. 48: 
ἔσεσθε οὖν ὑμεῖς τέλειοι. ἐν αὐτῷ, in 60 
(Vulg), ‘in Him,” i.e, in Christ and 
therefore in God (cf. ver. 24). According 
to Aug., ‘‘in it,” z.e., the chrism, wnctio 
(permanete in ipsa). 

Ver. 28. καὶ νῦν, continuing and rein- 
forcing the exhortation. ἐὰν φανερωθῇ : 
the uncertainty is not in the manifesta- 
tion but in the time of it, and this is the 
reason for steadfast abiding in Him. Cf. 
unwritten saying of Jesus: ἐφ᾽ ots yap 
ἂν εὕρω ὑμᾶς, φησὶν, ἐπὶ τούτοις καὶ 
κρινῶ. σχῶμεν, aor. marking the sud- 
denness of the crisis. παρρησία, pro- 
verly ‘‘ freedom of speech” (cf. Mark viil. 
2; John vii. 13, xvi. 29, xviii. 20; Acts 
ii. 29, iv. 29, 31, xxvili. 31); then “‘con- 
fidence,” ‘‘boldness,” especially before 
God (cf. Heb. iv. 16; τ John iii. 21, iv. 
17, v. 14), the attitude of children to 
their father in contrast with that of 
slaves to their master (cf. Sen. Ef. xlvii.: 
‘‘Infelicibus servis movere labra ne in 


hoc quidem ut loquantur licet. Virga 
murmur omne compescitur: . . . nocte 
tota jejuni mutique perstant”). Kat μὴ 
αἰσχυνθῶμεν, in contrast to σχῶμεν 


παρρησίαν. παρουσία, frequent in N.T. 
but only here in the Johannine writings. 
Not simply ‘“‘ presence” but ‘‘arrival,” 
*“tadvent” (adventus); cf. Luke xiii. 1: 
παρῆσαν, Matt. xi. 50, John xi. 28. 

Ver. 29. In view of the preceding 
verse δίκαιος must refer to Christ (cf. ii. 
1), and it is equally certain that ἐξ αὐτοῦ 
refers to the Father, since ‘‘ begotten of 
Christ” (cf. Tennysons “our fair father 
Christ”) is not a Scriptural idea. The 


6 κληθωμεν και ἐσμεν SABCP, Syrve, 


Vg. (et simus), Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., 


abrupt transition evinces St. John’s sense 
of the oneness of the Father and the 
Son (cf. ver. 24; John x. 30). γινώσκετε, 
scitote (Vulg.), rather cognoscite (Calv.), 
“ἐρεῖ to know,” ‘“‘recognise” (see note on 
ver. 3); perceive the blessed inference, 
appropriate your birthright. It enfeebles 
the sentence to take the verb as indicat. 

CuapTer III. Vv. 1-3. Our Present 
Dignity and Our Future Destiny. “See 
what unearthly love the Father hath 
given us, in order that we may be styled 
‘children of God’; and so weare. It is 
for this reason that the world doth not 
recognise us, because it did not recognise 
Him. Beloved, now are we children of 
God, and it was not yet manifested what 
we shall be. We know that, if it be 
manifested, we shall be like Him, be- 
cause we shall see Him even as He is. 
And every one that hath this hope rest- 
ing on Him purifieth himself even as the 
Lord is pure.” 

Ver. 1. St. John has been speaking of 
the salvation which Jesus has brought— 
His Propitiation and Advocacy, and he 
sees and would have his readers see in it 
an amazing expression of the love of God. 
Cf. John iii. 16. ποταπός (ποδαπός), 
properly cujas, “οὔ what country,” 
though approximating in late Greek to 
ποῖος, gualis, “οἵ what sort” (cf. Moul- 
ton, Gram. of N.T. Gk., i. p. 95), retains 
something of its proper and original 
signification. The love of God in Christ 
is foreign to this world: ‘‘ from what far 
realm ἢ whatunearthly love?” Cf. Matt. 
viii. 27: ‘‘ What unearthly personage ὃ ” 
2 Peter ili. 11: ‘‘ How other-worldly”. 
ἵνα, «.7.4., the purpose of this amazing 


I--3. 


οὐκ ἔγνω αὐτόν. 2. ἀγαπητοί, viv 


“ἐφανερώθη τί ἐσόμεθα: οἴδαμεν δὲ 1 


ἐσόμεθα, ὅτι ὀψόμεθα αὐτὸν καθώς ἐστι. 


> , > κε a ’ 
ἐλπίδα ταύτην ᾿ ἐπ᾽ αὐτῷ, * ἁγνίζει ἑαυτόν, καθὼς ἐκεῖνος ἢ ἁγνός ἐστι. 


iii. 21; Exod. xxxiv. 29. 


g John xi. 55; Acts xxi. 24; James iv. 8; 1 Peter i. 22. 


IQANOY A 


ὅτι “ ἐὰν φανερωθῇ, ὅμοιοι el ς 


183 


I τέκνα Θεοῦ ἐσμεν, καὶ οὔπω © δυό ἐς i. 26, 


16, 17. 

e Col. iii. 4; 
2 Cor. iil. 
18; Phil. 


3. Kat πᾶς 6 ἔχων τὴν 


f1 Tim. iv. 10; Acts xxiv. 15; Col. iv. 27; Ps. Ixxviii. 7, exlvi. 5. 


h 2 Cor. xi, 2; 1 Tim. v. 22. 


1 δε om. SNABCP, Syrph, Vg., Sah., Arm., edd. 


gift ; a wise, holy love, concerned for our 
highest good; not simply that we may 
be saved from suffering and loss but ‘in 
order that we may be styled ‘children of 
God’”. And we have not only the name 
but the character: ‘‘so we are”. Vulg. 
and Aug. give simus, as though reading 
ὦμεν for ἐσμὲν : ‘ that we should be styled 
and be”. Cf. Aug.: “Nam qui vocantur 
et non sunt, quid illis prodest nomen ubi 
res non est? Quam multi vocantur 
medici, qui curare non norunt? quam 
multi vocantur vigiles, qui tota nocte 
dormiunt?” διὰ τοῦτο, not anticipative, 
of ὅτι, but retrospective: ‘‘ for this rea- 
son,” viz., because we are children of 
God. ὅτι explains the inference: “ (and 
no wonder) because it did not recognise 
Him,” 2.6. the Father as revealed in His 
Son (cf. note on ii. 29). We must accept 
what our high dignity as children of God 
involves in a world alienated from God. 
On 6 κόσμος see note on ii. 15. Cf. 
Aug. : “Jam cum auditis mundum in 
mala significatione, non intelligatis nisi 
dilectores mundi, . . . Ambulabat et ipse 
Dominus Jesus Christus, in carne erat 
Deus, latebat in infirmitate. Et unde 
non est cognitus ἢ Quia omnia peccata 
arguebat in hominibus. Illi amando de- 
lectationes peccatorum non agnoscebant 
Deum: amando quod febris suadebat, 
injuriam medico faciebant.” 

Ver. 2. Having spoken of our present 
dignity, the Apostle goes on to speak of 
our future destiny. The Incarnation 
manifested our standing as children of 
God, but ‘it was not yet manifested 
what we shall be”. The aorist ἐφα- 
γερώθη (cf. ἔγνω in previous verse) refers 
to the historic manifestation in Jesus 
Christ. The N.T. says nothing definite 
about the nature of our future glory. 
With our present faculties we cannot 
conceive it. It must be experienced to 
be understood. Jesus simply assures us 
of the felicity of the Father’s House, and 
bids us take His word for it (cf. John xiv. 
2). ἐὰν φανερωθῇ, ‘if (cf. note on ii. 28) 
it may be manifested,” taking up οὕπω 
ἐφανερώθη. This obvious connection 15 
decisive against the rendering ‘‘ if He 
shall be manifested” (cf. 11. 28 ; Col. iii. 4). 


ὅτι, «.T.A.: What we shall be was not 
manifested, but this we know that we 
shall be like Him. And how do we 
know it? From His promise that “ we 
shall see Him even as He is” (cf. John 
xvii. 24). The argument is two-fold: (1) 
Vision of God implies likeness to Him in 
character and affection (cf. Matt. v. 8); 
(2) the vision of God transfigures (cf. 
2 Cor. iii. 18), even in this life. 


‘* Ah! the Master is so fair, 

His smile so sweet to banished men, 
That they who meet it unaware 

Can never rest on earth again.” 


And how will it be when we “see Him 
face to face” (x Cor. xiii. 12)? St. 
Augustine expresses much of the Apostle’s 
thought in a beautiful sentence: ‘‘ Tota 
vita Christiani boni sanctum desiderium 
est. 

Ver.3. The duty which our destiny im- 
poses. ἐπ᾽ αὐτῷ, “resting on Him,” bes 
on God as Father. Cf. Luke v. 5: ἐπὶ τῷ 
ῥήματί gov, “relying on Thy word i 
ἐκεῖνος, Christ; see note on ii. 6. aes 
also proves that the reference is to Christ. 
As distinguished from ἅγιος, which im- 
plies absolute and essential purity, it de- 
notes purity maintained with effort and 
fearfulness amid defilements and allure- 
ments, especially carnal. Cf. Plat. Def.: 
ἁγνεία εὐλάβεια τῶν πρὸς τοὺς θεοὺς 
ἁμαρτημάτων * τῆς θεοῦ τιμῆς κατὰ 
φύσιν θεραπεία. Suid. : ἐπίτασις σωφρο- 
σύνης. God is called ἅγιος but never 
Gyvos. Christ is ayvds because of His 
human experience. The duty of every 
one in view of his appearing before God, 
his presentation to the King, is ἁγνίζειν 
ἑαυτόν, like the worshippers before the 
Feast (John xi. 55), like the people before 
the Lord’s manifestation at Sinai (Exod. 
xix. 10-11, LXX). It is his own work, 
not God’s, or rather it is his and God’s. 
CF.) Pili re-135. Aug. Ὁ" “* Videte 
quemadmodum non abstulit liberum arbi- 
trium, ut diceret, castificat semetipsum. 
Quis nos castificat nisi Deus? Sed Deus 
te nolentem non castificat. Ergo quod 
adjungis voluntatem tuam Deo, castificas 
teipsum.” 


184 


~ , 
i Matt. vii, 4. Πᾶς ὁ ποιῶν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν, Kat 
" TT] a > Ls) 
5. καὶ οἴδατε ὅτι ἐκεῖνος 


Ἢ ip Ν i 
e k c 5 

+ ren ἐστὶν ἡ ἀνομία. 

XXX1. ἊΝ 
k Jobn i. 

1 Cor. fal δ 

56. 
1 it. 28 reff. αὐτόν, 
Ἢ Johni. 

29; Col. ii. 14. 


"ἐν αὐτῷ μένων, 
> A 3, > ’ 
οὐδὲ ἔγνωκεν αὐτόν. 
n ii. 6 ref. o Rom. vi. 14. 


lapaptias ἡμῶν τῷ 
Arm., Tert. (de Pudic. 19), Aug., edd. 


IQANOY A 


pronaes ἡμῶν ens καὶ ἁμαρτία ἐν αὐτῷ οὐκ ἔστι. 
“ οὐχ ἁμαρτάνει: 


CKL, Syrvg, Vg., Sah. ; 


11. 


ἱ τὴν ἀνομίαν ποιεῖ - καὶ 4 ἁμαρτία 
ἱ ἐφανερώθη, ἵνα τὰς 
6. πᾶς 
πᾶς ὁ ἁμαρτάνων, οὐχ ἑώρακεν 
7. Τεκνία,2 μηδεὶς πλανάτω P ὑμᾶς" 
pi. 8 reff. 

om. npev ABP, Syrph, Cop., Aeth., 


2 rexvia SYBKL, edd.; παιδια ACP, WH (marg.). 


Vv. 4-12. The Obligation of our 
Dignity as Children of God. ‘‘ Every 
one that doeth sin doeth also lawless- 
ness; and sin is lawlessness. And ye 
know that He was manifested that He 
might take away the sins; and sin in 
Him there is not. Every one that abideth 
in Him doth not keep sinning ; every one 
that keepeth sinning hath not seen Him 
nor got to know Him. Little children, 
let no one lead you astray: he that doeth 
righteousness is righteous, even as He is 
righteous; he that doeth sin is of the 
Devil, because from the beginning the 
Devil keepeth sinning. To this end was 
the Son of God manifested, that He might 
undo the works of the Devil. Every one 
that hath been begotten of God doeth 
not sin, because His seed in him abideth; 
and he cannot keep sinning, because of 
God he hath been begotten. Herein are 
manifest the children of God and the 
children of the Devil: every one that 
doeth not righteousness is not of God, 
and he that loveth not his brother. Be- 
cause this is the message which ye heard 
from the beginning, that we love one 
another. Not as Cain was of the Evil 
One and slew his brother. And where- 
fore did heslayhim? Because his works 
were evil, but his brother’s righteous.” 

Vy. 4-8. The Incompatibility of Son- 
ship with Continuance in Sin. 

Ver. 4. ὃ ποι. τὴν Gp., the converse 
of 6 ποι. τὴν Sik. (11. 29). νόμος, the 
revelation of God’s will, the Father’s 
requirement of His children, an expres- 
sion of the true law of their nature. 4 
ap. ἐστ. ἢ av. : the article in both subject 
and predicate make “sin” and “‘lawless- 
ness”’ convertible and co-extensive terms. 

Ver. 5. The purpose of the Incarna- 
tion was to “ take away the sins ”—atone 
for the sins of the past and prevent sins 
in the future. αἴρειν, properly “ lift up 
and carry away” (cf. Mark vi. 29; John 
ii. 16), but the idea of expiation is in- 
volved since it is ‘‘the Lamb of God” 
that ‘“‘ taketh away the sins”. ἐκεῖνος, 
see note on ii. 6. ἁμαρτία, “sin,” 1,6. 
the sinful principle; see note oni. 8. 


Ver. 6., This seems a stark contradic- 
tion of i. 8-ii. 2. (1) St. Augustine first 
limits the statement: ‘‘In quantum in 
ipso manet, in tantum non peccat,” and 
then narrows the idea of ‘‘sin” by defin- 
ing it as “ποῖ loving one’s brother” 
(vers. 10), (2) St. Bernard (De Nat. et 
Dign. Am. Div. vi.) compares Rom. vii. 
17, 20: ‘*secundum hoc quod natus est 
ex Deo, id est secundum interioris 
hominis rationem, in tantum non peccat, 
in quantum peccatum quod corpus mortis. 
foris operatur, odit potius quam approbat, 
semine spiritualis nativitatis quo ex Deo 
natus est eum interius conservante ” 
(3) Romanists limit ‘‘sin” to ‘ mortal 
sin”. (4) Many commentators say that 
St. John is thinking only of the ideal. 
All these simply explain away the em- 
phatic declaration. There is really no 
contradiction, and the Apostle’s meaning 
appears when account is taken of the 
terms he employs with accurate preci- 
sion. In the earlier passage hesays that 
there is indwelling sin in the believer. 
The sinful principle (ἁμαρτία) remains, 
and it manifests its presence by lapses 
from holiness—occasional sins, definite, 
isolated acts of sin. This is the iorce οἱ 
the aorists, ἁμάρτητε, ἁμάρτῃ in ii, I. 
Here he uses the present ἁμαρτάνειν. 
(varied by ποιεῖν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν) with the 
implication of continuance in sin. The 
distinction between present and aorist 
is well exemplified by Matt. vi. 11: δὸς. 
σήμερον as contrasted with Luke xi. 3: 
δίδου τὸ καθ᾽ ἡμέραν, and Matt. xiv. 22: 
ἐμβῆναι. .. καὶ προάγειν. The dis- 
tinction was obvious to St. John’s Greek. 
readers, and they would feel no difficulty 
when he said, on the one hand: ἐάν τις 
ἁμάρτῃ» Παράκλητον ἔ ἔχομεν, | and, on the 
other : πᾶς ὁ ἁμαρτάνων οὐχ ἑώρακεν 
αὐτόν. The believer may fall into sin 
but he will not walk in it. ‘* Hath not 
seen Him,” because he is ‘in the dark- 
ness” (cf. i. 5-7). 

Ver. 7. An _ affectionate warning. 
against Nicolaitan Antinomianism (cf. 
note on i. 6-7). The Apostle cuts away 
vain pretences by a sharp principle: a 


4—12. 


IQANOY A 


18 


on 


ὃ «ποιῶν τὴν δικαιοσύνην, δίκαιός ἐστι, καθὼς ἐκεῖνος "δίκαιος 4 lt. 29, ver. 


ἐστιν. 


‘dm ἀρχῆς ὁ διάβολος ἁμαρτάνει. 


τοῦ Θεοῦ, ἵνα "Adon “ τὰ ἔργα τοῦ διαβόλου. 


8. 6 ποιῶν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν, "ἐκ τοῦ διαβόλου ἐστίν - ὅτι τ ii. τ relf. 


iv. 7. 


εἰς τοῦτο " ἐφανερώθη ὁ υἱὸς “vim viii. 


u ii. 28 reff. 
ν Cf.comm, 


9. πᾶς ὁ γεγεννη- 


, “- ~ , a“ “- “- . 
ένος "ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ, ἁμαρτίαν οὐ ποιεῖ, ὅτι σπέρμα αὐτοῦ ἐν αὐτῷ Ww Matt. xi. 
> ᾽ Αἱ 


μένει - καὶ οὐ δύναται ἁμαρτάνειν, ὅτι ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ γεγέννηται. 


“ lol >. fol 
TO. ἐν τούτῳ *davepd ἐστι τὰ τέκνα τοῦ Θεοῦ καὶ τὰ τέκνα τοῦ 


διαβόλου. 


καὶ ὁ μὴ ἀγαπῶν τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ. 


ἣν " ἠκούσατε ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς, ἵνα ἀγαπῶμεν ἀλλήλους ° 


2; John 
Vii. 7, ix. 
3,4» X- 37; 
Rom. xiii. 
12; Gal. 


Πᾶς 6 μὴ * ποιῶν δικαιοσύνην, οὐκ ἔστιν ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ, v.19. 


χ iv. 7, ν. 


II. ὅτι αὕτη ἐστὶν ἡ " ἀγγελία :8. 


γι Cor. iii. 
13. Xi. 19; 
Gal. v. 19, 


12. οὐ καθὼς 


“ “ A Φ A 4 
*Kdiv ἐκ “tod πονηροῦ ἦν, Kal " ἔσφαξε τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ - καὶ χάριν z Ver. 7. 
- > nal. 5. 
τίνος ἔσφαξεν αὐτόν ; ὅτι τὰ ἔργα αὐτοῦ πονηρὰ ἦν, τὰ δὲ τοῦ "1.7; John 


XV. 12. ς Gen. iv. 8. 


righteous character expresses itself in 
righteous conduct. Christ (ἐκεῖνος) is 
the type. He was ‘‘the Son of God,” 
and if we are ‘children of God,” we 
must be like Him. 

Ver. 8. 6 ποι. τὴν Gp., an emphatic 
and interpretative variation of ὃ ἅμαρτ- 
avwv—‘‘he that makes sin his business 
or practice”. ἐκ of parentage (cf. vers. 
9); ‘‘ hoc est, ex patre diabolo” (Clem. 
Alex.). am ἀρχ., a vague phrase. In 
inn <*ere time began” >in it. 7, iil, 11] 
‘from the beginning of your Christian 
life”. Here “ from the beginning of his 
diabolic career”; “ἃ quo peccare ccepit 
incontrovertibiliter in peccando perse- 
verans” (Clem. Alex.). λύσῃ, ‘ loose,” 
metaphorically of ‘loosening a bond,” 
“relaxing an obligation” (Matt. v. 19; 
John v. 18), ‘‘ pulling to pieces” (John 
ii. 10). 

Ver. 9. The Reason of the Impossi- 
bility of a Child of God continuing in 
Sin. The germ of the divine life has 
been implanted in our souls, and it grows 
—a gradual process and subject to occa- 
sional retardations, yet sure, attaining at 
length to full fruition. The believer's 
lapses into sin are like the mischances 
of the weather which hinder the seed’s 
growth. The growth of a living seed 
may be checked temporarily ; if there be 
no growth, there is no life. This is the 
distinction between ἐάν tis ἁμάρτῃ and 
ὁ ἁμαρτάνων. Alexander in Speaker’s 
Comm. understands: ‘ His seed,” 2.6., 
whosoever is born of God (ef. Isa. liii. 
Io, Ixvi. 22), “ abideth in Him,” i.e., in 
God. This is Pauline but not Johann- 
ine. ‘He cannot keep sinning,” as the 
seed cannot cease growing. 

Vv. t0-12. The Evidence of Divine 
Sonship, viz., Human Brotherhood. 


ἃ ii, 13 reff. 


en ΧΙ, 34. 
e Rev. v. 6, 9, 12, xiii. 3, 8, xviii. 24. 


Ver. 10. The Apostle reiterates the 
“old commandment” (ii. 7-11) as not 
only the paramount duty of believers 
but the evidence of their divine sonship. 
He has said that the evidence lies in 
‘‘ doing righteousness,” and now he de- 
fines ποιεῖν δικαιοσύνην as ἀγαπᾶν τὸν 
ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ. See ποίε onii.g. The 
‘righteousness ” of the Pharisees con- 
sisted in ritual observance, that of Jesus 
in love. δίκαιος had the meaning 
“ kind,” ‘sweetly reasonable”. See 
Hatch, Ess. in Btb. Gk., p. 50 ff On 
Matt. i. 19 St. Chrysostom remarks : 
δίκαιον ἐνταῦθα τὸν ἐνάρετον ἐν ἅπασι 
λέγει. ἔστι μὲν γὰρ δικαιοσύνη καὶ τὸ 
μὴ πλεονεκτεῖν " ἔστι δὲ καὶ ἧ καθόλου 
ἀρετή. . . - δίκαιος οὖν ὧν. τούτεστι 
χρηστὸς καὶ ἐπιεικής. 

Ver. I1. ἵνα ecbatic, expressing not 
the aim but simply the substance of the 
message. Cf. John xvii. 3. See Moul- 
ton’s Gram. of N.T. Gk., p. 206; Moul- 
ton’s Winer, p. 425. 

Ver. 12. ov καθὼς, x.T.A., a loose, 
almost ungrammatical expression, analo- 
gous to John vi. 58. Were there no ov, 
ver. 11 might be regarded as a paren- 
thesis: ‘‘ he that loveth not his brother, 
even as Cain was, etc.”. The phrase 
is elliptical: ‘‘ We must not hate our 
brethren, even as Cain was, etc.”. τοῦ 
πον.» see note on ii. 18. ἔσφαξεν, a 
strong word, “slaughtered,” ‘‘ butchered,” 
properly by cutting the throat (jugulare), 
like an ox in the shambles. 

Vv. 13-24. The Secret of Assurance. 
“Wonder not, brethren, if the world 
hateth you. We know that we have 
migrated out of the domain of death into 
the domain of life, because we love the 
brethren. He that loveth not abideth in 
the domain of death. Everyone that 


186 


f John xv. 
18, 19; 
Matt. v. 


ἀδελφοῦ αὐτοῦ δίκαια. 


eA ε , 
UNAS ο κοσμοξ. 


IQANOY A 


ΤῊ; 


13. py} θαυμάζετε, ἀδελφοί pou,? εἰ * μισεῖ 
14. Ἡμεῖς οἴδαμεν ὅτι * μεταβεβήκαμεν ἐκ τοῦ 


11. 
gJohnv. Β θανάτου εἰς τὴν ζωήν, ‘Str ἀγαπῶμεν τοὺς ἀδελφούς - 6 μὴ ἀγαπῶν 


21. 
h a iv. τὸν ἀδελφόν,2 μένει ἐν τῷ θανάτῳ. τῷ. πᾶς ὁ μισῶν τὸν ἀδελ- 


i iv. 19. 4ke 


A τὶ col 
ον αὐτου 
k Only here $ 3 


and John οὐκ ἔχει ζωὴν αἰώνιον ἐν αὐτῷ ὃ μένουσαν. 


Viil. 44 in 4 ROG 
, NF καμεν THY AYaATHY, 
ll. O. 


6 


mJohnx. καὶ ἡμεῖς " ὀφείλομεν ὑπὲρ τῶν ἀδελφῶν τὰς ψυχὰς τιθέναι. 


ΤῊ, 15. ἔσει a 


18, xiii. OS 
37. 38, XV. 
Tae n il. 6 reff. 


o Mark xii. 44; Luke viii. 43; xv. 12, 30. 


, > , (ὦ χοῦ a A > , 
ἀνθρωποκτόνος ἐστί - καὶ οἴδατε ὅτι πᾶς ἀνθρωποκτόνος 


> 
16. Ἐν τούτῳ ἐγνώ- 


A Ὁ lo Εν ε Ν ε ~ > ὦ ‘ > na» 
ὅτι ᾿ ἐκεῖνος ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν ™ τὴν ψυχὴν αὐτοῦ ἔθηκε" 


ἘᾺΝ 


δ᾽ ἂν ἔχῃ τὸν " βίον τοῦ κόσμου, καὶ " θεωρῇ τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ 


p John xvii. 24, xx. 6, 12, 14, 


Matt. xxvii. 55, xxviii. 1; Mark v. 15, 38; Luke x. 18. 


1un ABCKL, Syrph, Vg., Cop., Sah., Aug., WH, Nest. ; και μὴ ΟΡ, Syrve, 


Aeth., Arm., Tisch. 


2 nov om. SABCP, Vg., Arm., Aug., edd. 
3 τον adeAdov om. NAB, Vg., Arm., Aug., edd. 


4 εαυτου B. 


8 τὴν ayamny Tov θεου one minusc., Vg. 


hateth his brother is a murderer, and ye 
know that every murderer hath not life 
eternal abiding in him. Herein have we 
got to know love, because He laid down 
His life for us; and we are bound to lay 
down our lives for the brethren. But 
whosoever hath the world’s goods, and 
beholdeth his brother in need. and locketh 
up his compassion from him, how doth 
the love of God abide in him? Little 
children, let us not love with word nor 
with the tongue, but in deed and truth. 
Herein shall we get to know that we are 
of the Truth, and in His presence shall 
assure our heart, whereinsoever our 
heart may condemn us, because greater 
is God than our heart, and He readeth 
everything. Beloved, if the heart con- 
demn not, we have boldness toward 
God, and whatever we ask we receive 
from Him, because we observe His com- 
mandments and do the things that are 
pleasing in His sight. And this is His 
commandment, that we believe the name 
of His Son Jesus Christ and love one 
another, even as He gave a command- 
ment to us. And he that observeth His 
commandments in Him abideth and He 
in him; and herein we get to know that 
He abideth in us—from the Spirit which 
He gave us.” 

Ver. 13. It is natural that the world 
(see notes on ii. 15, iii. 1) should hate 
those whose lives contradict its maxims 
and condemn its practices. St. John 
frequently addresses his readers as τεκνία 
and ἀγαπητοί, here only as ἀδελφοί. 
The term suits the context, where he 
enforces love of the brethren. It is no 
wonder if the world hate us, and its 


5 eautw SACLP, Tisch., WH (marg.); avrw BK, WH, Nest. 


7 θειναι SSABCP, edd. 


judgment is not decisive. Nevertheless 
our business is not to be hated by the 
world, but to commend Jesus to it and 
win it. We must not impute to the 
world’s hostility to goodness the conse- 
quences of our own unamiability or tact- 
lessness. ‘It is not martyrdom to pay 
bills that one has run into one’s self” 
(Geo. Eliot). 

Ver. 14. ἡμεῖς emphatic: “ Whatever 
the world may say, we know”. The 
test is not its hatred but our love. 
μεταβεβήκαμεν, ‘have migrated”. The 
word is used of transition from one place 
to another (John vii. 3, xiii. 1), of passing 
from one form of government to another 
(Plat. Rep. 550 D), of the transmigra- 
tion of souls (Luc. Gall. 4). 

Ver. 15. An echo of the teaching of 
Jesus. See Matt. v. 21-22 and cf. Smith, 
The Days of His Flesh, pp. 96-98. 

Ver. 16. τὴν ἀγάπην, ‘‘the thing 
called ‘love’”. The love of God in 
Christ Jesus our Lord is the perfect 
type. Till the world saw that, it never 
knew what love is. ἐκεῖνος, Christ; see 
note on ii. 6. ἡμεῖς emphatic, “ΜῈ on 
our part”. ὀφείλομεν, see note on ii. 6. 

Ver. 17. Love must be practical. 
It is easy to “lay down one’s life”: 
martyrdom is heroic and exhilarating ; 
the difficulty lies in doing the little things, 
facing day by day the petty sacrifices 
and self-denials which no one notices 
and no one applauds. τὸν βίον τοῦ 
κόσμου, ‘the livelihood of the world”; 
see note onii. 16. θεωρῇ, of a moving 
spectacle; cf. Matt. xxvii. 55. κλείσῃ, 
schliesst; the metaphor is locking the 
chamber of the heart instead of flinging 


13—20. 


« χρείαν ἔχοντα, καὶ τ κλείσῃ τὰ " σπλάγχνα αὐτοῦ ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ, " πῶς ἡ 4 
ἀγάπη τοῦ Θεοῦ μένει ἐν αὐτῷ ; 18. 
"λόγῳ μηδὲ γλώσσῃ, ἀλλ᾽ ἔργῳ ὃ καὶ ἀληθείᾳ. 
τούτῳ γινώσκομεν ὃ ὅτι ἐκ τῆς ἀληθείας ἐσμέν, καὶ ἔμπροσϑεν αὐτοῦ 


πείσομεν τὰς καρδίας ὃ ἡμῶν " 20. ὅτι ἴ " ἐὰν καταγινώσκῃ ἡμῶν ἡ 


IQANOY A 


187 


Mark ii. 

25; Eph. 

iv. 28. 

r Matt. 

19. Καὶ 4 ἐν xxiii. 14, 

XXV. I0; 

Luke iv. 
25; John 
XX. 19, 26. 

s Luke i. 


τεκνία μου, ph ἀγαπῶμεν 


καρδία, ὅτι ὃ μείζων ἐστὶν ὁ Θεὸς ὃ τῆς καρδίας ἡμῶν, καὶ γινώσκει 78; 5 Cor. 


Phil. 1, 8, 1.1. εἶν. 20; James ii. 15, 16. 


vl. 12: 


u James i. 22, 23, 25. v Mark vi. 23 (6, τι ἐάν). 


2 pov om. S$ABCP, Syrph, Arm., Aug., edd. 


2 unde τη ABCKL, edd. 


WH, Nest. 


5 γνωσομεθα SSABCP, Cop., Sah., Arm., 
Stas Kapdtas SQA2?CKLP, Syrph, Vg., 


Syrvg, Sah., Aeth., Aug., WH, Nest. 
7 Punct. ἡμῶν o τι. 


Sort om. A, several minusc., Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., Aug. 


it wide open and lavishing its treasures. 


σπλάγχνα, ΞΕ ΤΟ, viscera, ‘the in- 


? 


viewed by the ancients as 
the seat of the affections. Cf. Col. iii. 
12: σπλάγχνα oixtippot. ἡ ay. τ. O., 
“love for God” (objective genitive), in- 
spired by ard answering to the love which 
God feels (subjective genitive). Cf. note 
On ii. 5. 

Ver. 18. Observe the transition from 
instrumental dative to preposition ἐν: 
“not with word and the tongue but in 
the midst of deed and truth’—not in 
empty air but amid tangible realities. 
Cf. Bunyan, Good News: “ Practical 
love is best. Many love Christ with 
nothing but the lick of the tongue.” 
Sheridan, Sch. for Scand. v. i.: ‘‘ He 
appears to have as much speculative 
benevolence as any private gentleman in 
the kingdom, though he is seldom so 
sensual as to indulge himself in the exer- 
cise of it”. 

Vv. 19-20. Acrux interpretum. Read 
τὴν καρδίαν ἡμῶν 6, τι ἐάν (i.e. dv), and 
take the subsequent ὅτι as ‘‘ because”. 
The foregoing exhortation may have 
awakened a misgiving in our minds: 
“Am I lovingaslought?” Our failures 
‘in duty and service rise up befcre us, 
and ‘four heart condemns us”. So the 
Apostle furnishes a grand reassurance: 
“ Herein shall we get to know that we 
are of the Truth, and in His presence 
shall assure our heart, whereinsoever 
our heart may condemn us, because, 
etc.”. The reassurance is two-fold: (1) 
The worst that is in us is known to God 
(cf. Aug. : Cor tuum abscondis ab homine ; 
a Deo absconde si potes), and still He 


ward parts,’ 


3 ev epyw SABCLP, Arm., edd. 
4 καὶ SSCKLP, Syrvg, Sah., Aeth., Arm., 


Tisch. ; om. AB, Syrph, Vg., Cop., Aug., 


edd. 
Cop., Arm., Tisch.; τὴν καρδιαν A*B, 


ϑκυριος C. 


cares for us and desires us. Our dis- 
covery has been an open secret to Him 
allalong. (2) He ‘‘readeth everything” 
—sees the deepest things, and these are 
the real things. This is the true test of 
a man: Is the deepest that is in him the 
best? Is hebetterthanheseems? His 
failures lie on the surface: is there a 
desire for goodness deep down in his 
soul? Is he glad to escape from super- 
ficial judgments and be judged by God 
who ‘‘readeth everything,” who sees 
“with larger other eyes than ours, to 
make allowance for us all”? Cf. F. W. 
Robertson, Lett. lvi. : “1 remember an 
anecdote of Thomas Scott having said 
to his curate, who was rather agitated 
on having to preach before him, ‘ Well, 
sir, why should you be afraid before me, 
when you are not afraid before God?’ 
But how very easy it was to answer! 
He had only to say, God is not jea ous, 
nor envious, nor censorious ; besides, 
God can make allowances”. So Brown- 
ing :— 


‘« Thoughts hardly to be packed 
Into a narrow act, 
Fancies that broke through language and 
escaped ; 
All I could never be, 
All, men ignored in me, 
This, I was worth to God, whose wheel 
the pitcher shaped.” 


ἔμπροσθεν αὐτοῦ, and what matter how 
We appear ἔμπροσθεν τῶν ἀνθρώπων 
(Matt. vi. 1.)? πείσομεν, “ persuade,’ 
i.e. pacify, win the confidence, soothe 
the alarm, of our heart. Cf. Matt. xxviii. 
14. Otherwise: “ we shali persuade our 
heart . . . that greater is God”. But 


188 


w ii. 28 reff. 


1! 
x John xiv. eid 


IQANOY A 


III, 21---24. IV. 


21. ἀγαπητοί, ἐὰν ἡ καρδία ἡμῶν! ph καταγινώσκῃ 


ἘΝ 5 » A 
13, 14, χν. ημῶν,2 “ παρρησίαν ἔχομεν πρὸς τὸν Θεόν, 22. καὶ “ὃ ἐὰν αἰτῶμεν, 


7, 16, Xvi. 
23. 
y John viii. 


29. 

z Luke xii. 
6, Xv. I0, 
18, Xvi. 
15; John 
XX. 30; 
Rom. iii. 
20. 

a John vi. 
29, XV. 17. 

b iv. 13; 
Rom. viii. 


ἔϑωκεν. 


Deeley 
a Rom. ii. 


ἀρεστὰ “ ἐνώπιον αὐτοῦ ποιοῦμεν. 


καὶ ἀγαπῶμεν ἀλλήλους, " καθὼς ἔδωκεν ἐντολὴν ἡμῖν. 
τηρῶν τὰς ἐντολὰς αὐτοῦ, ἐν αὐτῷ μένει, καὶ αὐτὸς ἐν αὐτῷ. 


ao a 
τούτῳ γινώσκομεν ὅτι μένει ἐν ἡμῖν, 


λαμβάνομεν παρ᾽ ® αὐτοῦ, ὅτι τὰς ἐντολὰς αὐτοῦ τηροῦμεν, καὶ τὰ 


23. καὶ αὕτη ἐστὶν ἡ ἐντολὴ 


> a pee 2 4 FS AD) A ca 3 a? a a 
αὐτοῦ, ἵνα πιστεύσωμεν * τῷ ὀνόματι TOU υἱοῦ αὐτοῦ ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ, 


24. καὶ ὃ 
be} 
καὶ ἐν 


" ἐκ τοῦ Πνεύματος οὗ ἡμῖν 


IV. τ. ᾿Αγαπητοί, μὴ παντὶ πνεύματι πιστεύετε, ἀλλὰ " δοκιμάζετε 


18; Σ Cor. iii, 13, xi. 28; Gal. vi. 4; 1 Thess. v. 21. 


1npov ΜΌΟΚΙ,, Syrrg ph, Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., Tisch.; om. AB, several 


minusc., Aug., WH, Nest. 


Ξημων SAKL, Syrvs ph, Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., Tisch.; om. BC, one 


minusc., WH, Nest. 
3 απ ΑΒ0, edd. 


4πιστευσωμεν BKL, WH, Nest. ; πιστενωμεν SAC, Tisch., WH (marg.). 


how can love for the brethren yield this 
inference? γινώσκει πάντα, “ readeth 
every secret”. Cf. Johnii. 25. A quite 
different and less satisfying sense is got 
by punctuating τὴν καρδίαν ἡμῶν. ὅτι 
ἐάν, κιτλ. The second ὅτι is then a 
difficulty and has been dealt with in three 
ways: (1) It has been ignored as r-dund- 
ant: * For if our heart condemn us, God 
is greater, etc.” (A.V. fortified by the 
omission of the participle in some inferior 
MSS.). (2) Anvellipse has been assumed 
—either of the substantive verb: ‘‘ be- 
cause if our heart condemns us, (it is) 
because God, etc.” (Alford), or of δῆλον 
(Field, who compares I Tim. vi. 7) : “τ 
is plain that God, etc.”. (3) ὅτι has 
been conjecturally emended into ἔτι 
(Steph., Bez.): “ still greater is God, 
SiGe 

VW. παρρησίαν, see note on 
ii. 28. ὃ ἐὰν αἰτῶμεν λαμβάνομεν, though 
not always in the form we expect or 
desire ; the answer may be different from 
but it is always better than our prayer. 
St. Augustine draws a distinction between 
the hearing of prayer ‘tad salutem” and 
‘‘ad voluntatem,” comparing the experi- 
ence of St. Paul (2 Cor. xii. 7-9): “ Ro- 
gasti, clamasti, 'erclamasti: ipsum semel 
quod clamasti audivi, non averti aures 
meas a te; novi quid faciam; tu vis 
auferri medicamentum quo ureris; ego 
novi infirmitatem qua gravaris. Ergo 
iste ad salutem exauditus est, ad volun- 
tatem non est exauditus. ... Tu morbum 
confitearis, ille medicamentum adhibeat.” 
Cf. Juan de Avila: ‘Go to prayer rather 


21-22. 
a Os 


to hearken than tospeak. Bend humbly 
and lovingly before God, expecting.” 
τηροῦμεν, See note on il. 3. 

Ver. 23. Cf. our Lord’s summary of 
the commandments in Matt. xxii. 34-40 
= Mark xii. 28-31, and observe the apos- 
tolic narrowing of τὸν πλησίον σου (cf. 
Luke x. 29-37) to ἀλλήλους, 7.4. τοὺς 
ἀδελφούς (see note onii.g). τῷ ὀνόματι, 
see note on ii. 12. 

Ver. 24. τὰς ἐντ. avr., ‘the com- 
mandments of God,” resuming ver, 22. 
Cf. iv. 15. ἐκ, the assurance is begotten 
of the Spirit ; see note on ii. 21. οὗ for 
ὅ, by attraction to the case of the ante- 
cedent (cf. Luke ii. 20; Rev. xviii. 6). 
ἔδωκεν, “gave,” i.e., when first we be- 
lieved. For the thought cf. 2 Cor. i. 21, 
22; Eph.i. 13, 14; also Rom. viii. 15, 16. 

CuapTeR IV.—Vv. 1-6. The Spirit of 
Truth and the Spirit of Error. ‘‘ Be- 
loved, believe not every spirit, but prove 
the spirits, whether they are from God; 
because many false prophets have gone 
forth into the world. Herein ye get to 
know the Spirit of God: every spirit 
which confesseth Jesus as Christ come 
in flesh, is from God; and every spirit 
which confesseth not Jesus, is not from 
God. And this is the spirit of the Anti- 
christ, whereof ye heard that it is coming, 
and now it is in the world already. Ye 
are from God, littie children, and have 
conquered them, because greater is He 
that is in you than he that is in the 
world. They are from the world; there- 
fore from the world they talk, and the 
world hearkeneth tothem. Weare from 


Σ --3. ΙΩΑΝΟΥ A 189 
"τὰ πνεύματα, εἰ ἢ ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐστιν ᾿ ὅτι πολλοὶ © ψευδοπροφῆται "Ὁ Yer 26. 
4 ἐξεληλύθασιν εἰς τὸν κόσμον. 2. ἐν τούτῳ γινώσκετε ' τὸ Πνεῦμα “ erga 

τοῦ Θεοῦ πᾶν πνεῦμα ὃ © ὁμολογεῖ ᾿Ιησοῦν Χριστὸν ἐν σαρκὶ ἐληλυ- mai τὰν 
ϑότα,2 ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐστι. 3. καὶ πᾶν πνεῦμα ὃ μὴ ὁμολογεῖ ὃ τὸν ἼΩΝ 
᾿Ιησοῦν Χριστὸν ὁ ἐν σαρκὶ ἐληλυϑότα,Σ ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ οὐκ ἔστι" καὶ ᾿ς 5 vy 


‘TodTé ἐστι TO τοῦ ἀντιχρίστου, ὃ ἀκηκόατε ὅτι ‘épxetat, καὶ νῦν ἐν i Jone Υ; 
onn 
xiii. 3, xvi. 27, 28, 30, xvii. 8; 1 Cor. xiv. 36. e John ix. 22; 2 John 7. fii. 18 reff. 

1 γινώσκετε SCABCL, Syrph, Cop., Sah., Aeth., edd. ; γινωσκεται K, Syrvg, Vg., 
Aug.—an itacism. 

Ξεληλυϑοτα SSACKL, edd. ; ἐληλυθεναι B, Vg., WH (marg.). 

3 μη opodoyer all Gk. MSS. and all versions except Vg.; Ave Socr. H. E. vii. 
32 (of .Nestorius): αὐτίκα γοῦν ἠγνόησεν ὅτι ἐν τῇ καθολικῇ ᾿Ιωάννου ἐγέγραπτο ἐν 
τοῖς παλαιοῖς ἀντιγράφοις ὅτι πᾶν πνεῦμα ὃ λύει τὸν ᾿Ιησοῦν ἀπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ οὐκ ἔστι. 

΄ , a A κι Α 
ταύτην γὰρ τὴν διάνοιαν ἐκ τῶν παλαιῶν ἀντιγράφων περιεῖλον οἱ χωρίζειν ἀπὸ 
τοῦ τῆς οἰκονομίας ἀνθρώπου βουλόμενοι τὴν θεότητα " διὸ καὶ οἱ παλαιοὶ ἑρμηνεῖς 
«αὐτὸ τοῦτο ἐπεσημήναντο, ὥς τινες εἶεν ῥαδιουργήσαντες τὴν ἐπιστολήν, λύειν ἀπὸ 


τοῦ θεοῦ τὸν ἄνθρωπον θέλοντες. 
Tesum, non est ex Deo. 


omnis spiritus qui solvit Iesum. Aug.: 


Iren. 
Orig. in Matth. Comm. Ser. 65 (Lomm. iv. p. 360). 


111. xvii. 8: δέ omnis spiritus qui solvit 
Nina 


omnis spiritus qut solvit Christum (after 


quoting omnis spiritus qui non confitetur Fesus Christum in carne ventsse). 
ἜΧριστον om. AB, Syrvegph, Vg., Cop., Aeth., Arm., Iren., Orig., Socr., edd. ; 


“‘«upLov RY. 


5 ἐν σαρκι ἐληλυθοτα om. AB, Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., edd. 


God; he that is getting to know God 
hearkeneth to us; one who is not from 
God, hearkeneth not to us. From this 
“we get to know the Spirit of Truth and 
the spirit of error.” 

1. The Apostle has just said that the 
Spirit begets in us the assurance that 
God abideth in us. And this suggests a 
warning. The Cerinthian heresy also 
had much to say about “the spirit”. It 
boasted a larger spirituality. Starting 
-with the philosophical postulate of an 
irreconcilable antagonism between mat- 
ter and spirit, it denied the possibility of 
‘the Incarnation and drew a distinction 
between Jesus and the Christ (see Introd., 
p. 157). Its spirit was not ‘the Spirit of 
Truth” but ‘‘a spirit of error,” and thus 
‘the necessity arises of ‘‘ proving the 
spirits”. δοκιμάζειν, of “ proving” or 
“testing” a coin (νόμισμα). If it stood 
the test, it was δόκιμον (cf. 2 Cor. x. 18) ; 
‘if it was found counterfeit (κίβδηλον), it 
was ἀδόκιμον (cf. τ Cor. ix. 27 ; 2 Cor. xiii. 
5-7). Cf. Jer. vi. 30 LXX: ἀργύριον 
-ἀποδεδοκιμασμένον . . . ὅτι ἀπεδοκί- 
μασεν αὐτοὺς Κύριος. ἐκ, here of commis- 
sion, not parentage ; “ from God,” as His 
~messengers. Cf. John i. 24; xviii. 3; 
Soph., O.C., 735-737: ἀπεστάλην. -. 
"οὐκ ἐξ ἑνὸς στείλαντος. πολλοί: Cer- 
inthus had a large following. ἐξεληλ. 
«εἰς τ. κόσμ., a monstrous reversal of 
John xvii. 18. They went forth from the 


Church into the world not to win but to 
deceive it. 

2, The Test of the Spirits. γινώσκετε, 
as in ii. 29, may be either indicat. (‘‘ye 
recognise”) or, like πιστεύετε, δοκιμάζετε, 
imp -ταῖ. (“recognise”). The former seems 
preferable. ὁμολογεῖ ᾿Ιησοῦν Χριστὸν ἐν 
σαρκὶ ἐληλυθότα, “confesseth Jesus as 
Christ come in flesh,” an accurate defini- 
tion of the doctrine which the Cerinthian 
heresy denied. The argument is destroyed 
by the false variant ἐληλυθέναι, ‘“con- 
fesseth that Jesus Christ hath come,” con- 
jitetur Fesum Christum in carne venisse 
(Vulg.) 

Ver. 3. The Test negatively expressed. 
Omit Χριστὸν ἐν σαρκὶ ἐληλυθότα. τὸν 
Ἰησοῦν, ‘the aforementioned Jesus,” 
“ὁ Jesus as thus described”. μή makes the 
statement hypothetical: “every spirit, if 
such there be, which doth not confess”. 
The variant Aver τὸν Ἰησοῦν. solvit 
Fesum (Vulg., Aug.), “dissolveth” or 
“severeth Jesus,” i.¢., separates the di- 
vinity and the humanity, aptly defines 
the Cerinthian heresy. It was much 
appealed to in later days against Nesto- 
rius. The ecclesiastical historian Socrates 
(see crit. note) says it was the primitive 
reading, and was altered by “those who 
wished to separate the deity from the 
man of the Incarnation”. St. Augustine, 
defining heresy as schism due to lack of 
brotherly love, comments: ‘‘Ille venit 


190 


g John xvi. 


“-“ , > 4 nod 
33. Tw κοσμῳ εστιν 107). 
h John xiv. 

30. 

i ii. 16 reff. 
k John iii. 

31, Vill. ἰῷ 

ΩΝ eo eR 
1 John viii. 

43, 47. 


κόσμος αὐτῶν ἀκούει. 


LQANOY A 


> Ἄς 5 A , ΓΒΕ, Ὁ 
5. Αὔτοι ἐκ τοῦ κόσμου εἰσι 


IV. 


ε ο A ~ , A 

4. Ὑμεῖς ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐστε, τεκνία, καὶ 
ν᾿ ΠῚ ΄, ‘ a a 

ὁ νενικήκατε αὐτούς "1 ὅτι μείζων ἐστὶν 6 ἐν ὑμῖν ἢ ἢ ὁ ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ. 


διὰ τοῦτο " ἐκ τοῦ κόσμου λαλοῦσι, καὶ 


6. ἡμεῖς ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐσμεν" ὃ γινώσκων 


x , > , τ eee ΝΑ > μι 3 A nm 2 > ΄ cn 
τὸν Θεόν, ἀκούει NUGY* ὃς οὐκ ἐστιν EK TOU Θεοῦ, οὐκ ἀκούει ἡμῶν. 


> 
mi.8reff; Ex τούτου γινώσκομεν τὸ πνεῦμα τῆς ἀληθείας Kal τὸ πνεῦμα τῆς 


Matt. m ah 
xxvii. 64; ™ πλάνης. 
Eph. iv. nS 


7. ᾿Αγαπητοί, " ἀγαπῶμεν ἀλλήλους * ὅτι ἡ ἀγάπη ἐκ τοῦ 


a > Ν A Ce - o> A A , ‘ id 
14; James Θεοῦ ἐστι, καὶ πᾶς ὁ ἀγαπῶν, ° ἐκ TOU Θεοῦ γεγέννηται, καὶ γινώσκει 


Vv. 20. 


Ὦ ii. 7, iil. 11- O ii. 29, iii. 9. 


Ἰαυτους Aug. cum., t.e., Antichristum. 


colligere, tu venis solvere. Distringere 
vis membra Christi. Quomodo non negas 
Christum in carne venisse, qui disrumpis 
Ecclesiam Dei, quam ille congregavit ?” 
On the Antichrist see note on ii. 18. 
ὃ ἀκηκόατε ὅτι ἔρχεται; “which ye have 
heard that it is coming”—the regular 
Greek idiom. Cf. Luke iv. 34: οἶδά oe 
τίς εἶ. 

Ver. 4. ὑμεῖς emphatic (cf. ii. 20, 27, 
iii, 14), as contrasted with the deluded 
world. The faithtul are God’s delegates 
(éx), bearing their Master’s commission 
and continuing His warfare (John xx. 
21), and they have shared His victory 
(νενικήκατε). αὐτοὺς, i.e., the false pro- 
phets (ver. 1). Eum (Vulg.); “Quem 
nisi Antichristum?” (Aug.). ὁ ἐν ὑμῖν, 
i.e., God (cf. iii. 24); ὃ ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ, ἑ ε., 
ὁ ἄρχων τοῦ κόσμου τούτου (John xii. 
31 xiv. 30). 

Ver. 5. αὐτοὶ (as opposed to ὑμεῖς) ἐκ 
τοῦ κόσμου εἰσίν, as its delegates, mes- 
sengers, representatives, and as such 
ἐκ τοῦ κόσμου λαλοῦσιν. λαλεῖν, not 
“speak” (λέγειν),Ἠ ut “talk,” with a 
suggestion of prating (cf. John iv. 42). 
ἀκούειν takes accus. of the thing heard, 
genit. of the person from whom it is 
heard. Cf. Luke v. 1; Acts i. 4 (where 
both are combined). The world listens 
to those who speak its own language. 

Ver. 6. Conversely, those who are get- 
ting to know God, understand the lan- 
guage of His messengers and listen to it. 
ἐκ τούτου, t.e, from their hearkening or 
not hearkening. Men’s attitude to the 
message of the Incarnate Saviour ranks 
them on this side or on that—on God’s 
side or the world’s. Of course St. John 
does not ignore St. Paul’s ἀληθεύοντες 
ἐν ἀγάπῃ (Eph. iv. 15). The message 
may be the truth and be rejected, not be- 
cause of the hearers’ worldliness, but 
because it is wrongly delivered—not 
graciously and winsomely. Cf. Rowland 
Hill’s anecdote of the preaching barber 
who had made a wig for one of his 


hearers—badly made and nearly double 
the usual price. When anything parti- 
cularly profitable escaped the lips of the 
preacher, the hearer would observe to 
himselt: “ Excellent! This should touch 
my heart; but oh, the wig!’ ‘tis 
ἀληθείας, see note on i. 8. τὸ mv. τῆς 


πλάνης, ‘the spirit that leadeth astray ”, 


Vv. 7-21. The Blessedness of Love. 
‘Beloved, let us love one another, be- 
cause love is of God, and every one that 
loveth of God hath Leen begotten and is. 
getting to know God. He that loveth 
not did not get to know God, because 
God is love. Herein was manifested the 
love of God in us, because His Son, His 
only-begotten, hath God commissioned 
into the world, that we may get life 
through Him. Herein is the love, not 
that we have loved God, but that He 
loved us and commissioned His Son as a. 
propitiation for our sins. 

‘* Beloved, if it was thus that God loved 
us, we a.so are bound to love one another. 
God—no one hath ever yet beheld Him: 
if we love one another, God abideth 
in us and His love is perfected in_us, 
Herein we get to know that we abide in 
Him and He in us, because of Hls Spirit 
He hath given us. And we have beheld 
and testify that the Father hath commis- 
sioned the Son as Saviour of the world. 
Whosoever confesseth that Jesus is the 
Son of God, God in him abideth and he 
in God. And we have got to know and 
have believed the love which God hath 
in us. 

‘“*God is love, and he that abideth in 
love in God abideth, and God in him 
abideth. Herein hath love been per- 
fected with us—so that we may have 
boldness in the Day of Judgment— 
because, even as He is, we also are in 
this world. Fear there is not in love, but 
the perfect love casteth out fear, because 
fear hath punishment; and he that feareth 
hath not been perfected inlove. We love 
because He first loved us. If one say, 


IQANOY A 


4—I1. 


IQ! 


τὸν Θεόν" 8. ὁ μὴ ἀγαπῶν, " οὐκ ἔγνω τὸν Oedv* ὅτι 46 Θεὸς ἀγάπη P|. ae 


ὅτι τὸν 4 ἷν. 16. 
r Johni. 14, 


ε A A one 
υἱὸν αὐτοῦ τὸν * μονογενῆ " ἀπέσταλκεν 6 Θεὸς εἰς τὸν κόσμον, ἵνα be iii. 16, 
ζήσωμεν δι᾿ αὐτοῦ. 


, A a ~ 
ἐστίν. 9. Ἐν τούτῳ ἐφανερώθη ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐν ἡμῖν, 


1ο. ἐν τούτῳ ἐστὶν ἡ ἀγάπη, " οὐχ ὅτι ἡμεῖς 5 sas 
ἠγαπήσαμεν ' τὸν Θεόν, ἀλλ᾽ ὅτι αὐτὸς ἠγάπησεν ἡμᾶς, καὶ ἀπέσ- ili. 17, xx. 
21. 
τειλε τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ " ἱλασμὸν περὶ τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν ἡμῶν. II. ἀγαπη-! ΠΡΊΝ 
Ι 


τοί, εἰ " οὕτως ὁ Θεὸς ἠγάπησεν ἡμᾶς, " καὶ ἡμεῖς " ὀφείλομεν ἀλλήλους u Ver. το. 


w John iii. 16. 


x Rom. xiii. 8; Matt. xviii. 33; Rom. xv. 7; Eph. iv. 32; Coll. iii. 13. 


ν ii. 2 reff. 
y ii. 6 reff. 


I ηγαπήσαμεν SCKL, Tisch., WH (marg.)—an assimilation to the other aors. ; 


γαπήκαμεν B, WH, Nest. 


‘I love God,’ and hate his brother, he is 
aliar. For he that loveth not his brother 
whom he hath seen, God whom he hath 
not seen, he cannot love. And this com- 
mandment have we from Him, that he 
that loveth God love also his brother.” 

Ver. 7. St. John reiterates the “old 
commandment” (ii. 7-11). It is so all- 
important that he cares not though his 
readers be tired of hearing it. Cf. the 
anecdote which St. Jerome relates on 
Gal. vi. το: “ Beatus Joannes Evangelista 
cum Ephesi moraretur usque ad ultimam 
senectutem, et vix inter discipulorum 
manus ad Ecclesiam deferretur, nec posset 
in plura vocem verba contexere, nihil aliud 
per singulas solebat proferre collectas 
nisi hoc: Filioli, diligite alterutrum. 
Tandem discipuli et fratres qui aderant, 
tedio affecti quod eadem semper audi- 
rent, dixerunt: Magister, quare semper 
hoc loqueris? Qui respondit dignam 
Joanne sententiam: Quia preceptum 
Domini est, et si solum fiat, sufficit.” 
Love is the divine nature, and those who 
love have been made partakers of the 
divine nature (2 Peter i. 4); and by the 
practice of love they ‘‘ get to know God” 
more and more. 

Ver. 8. Conversely, a stranger to love 
is a stranger to God. οὐκ ἔγνω, “did not 
get to know,” 7.e., at the initial crisis of 
conversion. On μὴ see note on ii. 4. 

Ver. 9. The Incarnation is a manifes- 
tation of the love of God because it isa 
manifestation of the divine nature, and 
the divine nature is love. ἐν ἡμῖν, “in 
our souls”—an inward experience. Cf. 
Gal. i. 16: ἀποκαλύψαι τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ 
ἐν ἐμοί. μονογενῆ, cf. Luke vii. 12, viii. 
42, ix. 38. St. John applies the term ex- 
clusively to Jesus. It carries the idea 
of preciousness; cf. LXX Pss. xxii? 20, 


xxxv. 17, where SVT), “my dear life,” 


is rendered τὴν μονογενῆ pov. ἀπέσ- 
ταλκεν. “hath sent as an ἀπόστολος" 


(cf. Heb. iii. 1). An apostle is not simply 
nuntius, but nuntius vices mittentis ge- 
rens. Cf. Bab. Ber. 34, 2: “ Apostolus 
cujusvis est sicut ipse a quo deputatur”’. 
The perf. is used here because the in- 
fluence of the Incarnation is permanent. 
ζήσωμεν, ingressive or inceptive aor. 
Cf. Luke xv. 24, 32; Rev. xx. 4,5. ἵνα 
ζήσωμεν reconciles ἐφανερώθη ἡ ἀγάπη 
with ἡ ζωὴ ἐφανερώθη (i. 2). The Incar- 
nation manifested the love of God, and 
the love was manifested that we might 
get life. Eternal Life is not future but 
present: we get it here and now. Cf. 
John xvii. 3. Amiel: ‘‘ The eternal life 
is not the future life; it is life in harmony 
with the true order of things—life in God”. 

Ver. 10. The love which proves us 
children of God is not native to our 
hearts. It is inspired by the amazing 
love of God manifested in the Incarna- 
tion—the infinite Sacrifice of His Son’s 
life and death. Aug.: “Non illum di- 
leximus prius: nam ad hoc nos dilexit, ut 
diligamus eum.” ἀπέστειλεν: the aor. 
is used here because the Incarnation is 
regarded as a distinct event, a historic 
landmark. 

Having inculcated love, the Apostle 
indicates two incentives thereto: (1) 
God’s love for us imposes on us a moral 
obligation to love one another (11-16a); 
(2) lf we have love in our hearts, fear is 
cast out (160-18). 

Ver. 11. Here, as in John iii. 16, οὕτως 
may denote either the extent or the 
manner of God’s love—‘‘to such an ex- 
tent,” going such a length (cf. Rom. viii. 
32); ‘‘in such a manner,” righteously, 
not by a facile amnesty but by a propi- 
tiation. ὀφείλομεν : see note on ii. 6. 
Noblesse oblige. If we are God’s chi'- 
dren, we must have our Father’s spirit. 
Cf. Matt. v. 44-48. Thus we requite His 
love. Aug.: “Petre, inquit, amas me ? 
Et ille dixit: Amo. Pasce oves meas” 
(John xxi. 15-17). 


192 


Zieh ret. 
Johni. 18. 

a Ver. 16, 
iii. 24. 

b ii. 5 reff. 

ς iii. 24 reff. 

di. τ ref. 

ei. 2 reff. 

f John iii, 
17, iv. 42. 


ἀγαπᾶν. 


τὶ ca 1 
ἐν ἡμῖν. 


IQANOY A 


IV. 


12. Θεὸν οὐδεὶς πώποτε τεθέαται ᾿ ἐὰν ἀγαπῶμεν ἀλλή- 
λους, " ὁ Θεὸς ἐν ἡμῖν μένει, καὶ ἡ ἀγάπη αὐτοῦ ἢ" τετελειωμένη ἐστὶν 
> , , φ 5 > ~ lf ‘ > A 

13. ἐν τούτῳ γινώσκομεν ὅτι ἐν αὐτῷ μένομεν, καὶ αὐτὸς 
> ca oe @e? A »» 5» “- a ἘΣ ὅν 
ἐν ἡμῖν, ὅτι * ἐκ τοῦ Πνεύματος αὐτοῦ δέδωκεν ἡμῖν. 

14. Καὶ ἡμεῖς “τεθεάμεθα, καὶ © μαρτυροῦμεν ὅτι ὁ πατὴρ ἀπέσ- 
die aie xvi. ταλκε τὸν υἱὸν σωτῆρα τοῦ κόσμου. 


15. “ὃς ἄν ὁμολογήσῃ ὅτι 


10, 17. | ies in a ~ - 
hJohn vi. Ἰησοῦς ἐστιν 6 υἱὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ, 6 Θεὸς ἐν αὐτῷ μένει, καὶ αὐτὸς ἐν τῷ 


Θεῷ. 


15, Xi. 22, 
24, X1i. 36 ; 
2 Peter ii. 
B17 ῳ 

I. 
o Matt. v. 


ἐσμεν ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ τούτῳ. 
13,Χ111..48; 


K ἐν τῷ Θεῷ μένει, καὶ ὁ Θεὸς ἐν αὐτῷ. 
ε t > *- et 


16, Καὶ ἡμεῖς " ἐγνώκαμεν καὶ πεπιστεύκαμεν τὴν ἀγάπην ἣν 
ὁ Θεὸς ἀγάπη ἐστί, καὶ ὁ μένων ἐν τῇ ἀγάπῃ, 


2 


17. Ἐν τούτῳ ἢ" τετελείωται ἡ ἀγάπη μεθ᾽ ἡμῶν, ἵνα | παρρησίαν 
nifoba xx. ἔχωμεν ™ ἐν TH ἡμέρᾳ τῆς κρίσεως, ὅτι " καθὼς ἐκεῖνός ἐστι, Kal ἡμεῖς 
ih 18. φόβος οὐκ ἔστιν ἐν τῇ ἀγάπῃ, ἀλλ᾽ 


Luke xiv. ἡ τελεία ἀγάπη ° ἔξω βάλλει τὸν " φόβον, ὅτι 6 φόβος “ κόλασιν "ἔχει " 


ν hom. viii, ὁ δὲ φοβούμενος οὐ > τετελείωται ἐν τῇ ἀγάπῃ. 


15; Heb. 


11. 15. q Matt. xxv. 46. r James i. 4. 


1 ev ἡμῖν ἐστιν NB, edd. 


19. "ἡμεῖς ἀγαπῶ- 


s Ver. 10. 


2ey αὐτω peve. SBKL, Syrph, Cop., Sah., Arm., Aug., Tisch., WH (brack.), 


Nest. 


Ver. 12. ‘*God—no one hath ever yet 
beheld Him”. By and by ‘‘ we shall see 
‘Him even as He is” (iii. 2), but even now, 
if we love, we are no strangers to Him: 
He abides and works in us. TereAerwpévn, 
ἐς carried to its end” ; see note on ii. 5. 

Ver. 13. Cf. iii. 24. The argument 
is that God would not have granted us 
this priceless gift if he were not in in- 
timate relation with us and had not a 
steadfast purpose of grace toward us. 

Ver. 14. The apostolic testimony (cf. 
i. 1-3). ἡμεῖς, either the editorial ‘‘ we” 
or “1 and the rest of the Apostles who 
were eye-witnesses”. ἀπέσταλκεν, see 
note on ver. 9. 

Ver. 15. ὁμολογήσῃ; aor. of a definite 
confession born of persuasion. Such a 
conviction implies fellowship with God. 

Ver. 16. ἡμεῖς, here “ you and I,” we 
believers. Observe the three stages: (1) 
“ vet to know” (γινώσκειν), (2) ““ believe” 
(πιστεύειν), (3) “confess” (ὁμολογεῖν). 
-éy ἡμῖν, see note on ver. 9. 

Another incentive to love: it casts out 
fear. τῇ ἀγάπῃ. “the love just men- 
tioned”. Cf. τὸν φόβον, ὁ φόβος (ver. 18). 

Ver. 17. τετελείωται, cf. ver. 12. μεθ᾽ 
ἡμῶν: love is a heavenly visitant so- 
journing with us and claiming observ- 
ance. Love has been ‘carried to its 
end” when we are like Jesus, His visible 
representatives. ὅτι resumes ἐν τούτῳ, 
ἄνα... κρίσεως being parenthetical: 
“herein. . . because” (iii. 16, iv. 9, ro). 


παρρησίαν, see note on ii. 28. ἐκεῖνος, 
see note on ii. 6. ἐστιν, “is,” not ἦν, 
“was”. Jesus is in the world unseen, 
and our office is to make Him visible. 
We are to Him what He was to the 
Father in the days of His flesh—* Dei 
inaspecti aspectabilis imago”. 

Ver. 18. Bern.: “Amor reverentiam 
nescit”. φόβος, the opposite of παρρη- 
cia. κόλασιν ἔχει, “implies punish- 
ment,” the portion of slaves. The portion 
of slaves is punishment (κόλασις) and 
their spirit fear; the portion of sons 1s 
chastisement (παιδεία) and their spirit 
boldness (παρρησία). Cf. Heb. xii. 7, 
Clem. Alex.: ‘‘ Perfectio fidelis hominis 
caritas est”. Aug.: ‘‘ Major charitas, 
minor timor; minorcharitas, majortimor”. 
Bengel has here one of his untranslatable 
comments: ‘ Varius hominum status: 
sine timore et amore; cum timore sine 
amore; cum timore et amore; sine timore 
cum amore”. 

Ver. 19. ἀγαπῶμεν has no accus. 
The thought is that the amazing love of 
God in Christ is the inspiration of all the 
love that stirs inour hearts. Itawakens 
within us an answering love—a grateful 
Jove jor Him manifesting itself in love 
for our brethren (cf. ver. 11). The in- 
sertion of αὐτόν is a clumsy and unneces- 
sarygloss. Neithershould οὖν beinserted 
and ἀγαπῶμεν taken as hortat. subjunc- 
tive. Vuig.: ‘‘Nos ergo diligamus 
Deum, quoniam Deus prior dilexit nos”. 


12—21. V. I—3. 


ae Re 
μεν αὐτὸν, 


IQANOY A 


ὅτι αὐτὸς 2 πρῶτος ἠγάπησεν ἡμᾶς. 
ρῶτος ἠγάπησεν rp 


193 


tii. 9, iii, 


ι᾽ » 
20. “Ἐάν τις εἴπη, Hae 


a) > a ek ἐν. ms TCH A'S x anit nu 5 ui. 6 reff. 
Οτι ἀγαπῶ τὸν Oedv, καὶ Tov ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ μισῇ, ψεύστης ἃ 


ἐστίν " 6 γὰρ μὴ ἀγαπῶν τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ ὃν ἑώρακε, τὸν Θεὸν " ὃν 


er. 12 
reff. 
w ii. 7 reff. 


οὐχ ἑώρακε, πῶς δύναται ἀγαπᾶν ;3 21. καὶ “ταύτην Thy ἐντολὴν ἃ iv. 15 ref 


ἔχομεν ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ," 


αὐτοῦ. 


b iii. 9 reff. 


ἵνα 6 ἀγαπῶν τὸν Θεόν, ἀγαπᾷ καὶ τὸν ἀδελφὸν ς τ Peter i, 


22. 23. 


Xiii. 4, 5. 


V. τ. Πᾶς ὁ πιστεύων ὅτι "Ἰησοῦς ἐστιν 6 Χριστός, Ὁ ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ e John xiv. 


’ 5 CCA CoA) a x , » A \ 
γεγέννηται και “πᾶς oO αγαπων τον γεννησαντα ay ara και 


γεγεννημένον © ἐξ αὐτοῦ. 


5 x. 159 23 24 
τὸν 


ἃ 5 , , « 3 “A Η͂ 
2. εν τούτῳ γινώσκομεν οτι αἀγατπωμεν τα 


έ a a ov A a > a ‘ ‘ > Xe 3 A 
τέκνα TOU Θεοῦ, ὅταν τὸν Θεὸν ἀγαπῶμεν, καὶ Tag ἐντολὰς αὐτοῦ 


τηρῶμεν.ἵ 


3. " αὕτη γάρ ἐστιν ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ Θεοῦ, ἵνα τὰς ἐντολὰς 


Tavtov om. AB, Aeth., Aug., edd. ; τον θεον δῷ, Syrvg ph, Vg., Cop., Arm. 
2 avtos SBKL, Syrvg ph, Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., Aug., edd. ; 0 θεος A, Vg. 


Sov Suvarat ayamav SB, Syrph, Sah., edd. 


4 amo του θεου A, Vg. 


Sayama καὶ S$AKLP, Syrve ph, Vg., Aeth., Arm., Tisch. ; om. και B, Sah., Aug., 


WH, Nest. 
8 το γεγεννημενον NY. 


7 rnpwpev KL P—an assimilation to τηρωμεν in v. 3; ποιωμεν B, Syrvg ph, Vg. 


Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., Aug., edd. 


Ver. 20. Lest the vagueness of the 
objectless ἄγαπῶμεν encourage false 
security, St. John reiterates the old test : 
Love for the invisible Father is mani- 
fested in love for the brother by our 
side, the image of the Father. Cf. 
Whittier :— 


“ Not thine the bigot’s partial plea, 
Nor thine the zealot’s ban; 

Thou well canst spare a love of thee 
Which ends in hate of man”. 


ψεύστης, see note on i. 6, 

Ver. 21. The Old Commandment. Cf. 
17-10. 

CuHaPTER V.—Vvy. 1-5. What makes 
the Commandments of God easy. 
“Every one that hath faith that Jesus 
is the Christ hath been begotten of 
God; and every one that loveth Him 
that begat loveth him that hath been 
begotten of Him. Herein we get to 
know that we love the children of 
God, whenever we love God, and do His 
commandments. For this is the love 
of God, that we should observe His 
commandments ; and Hiscommandments 
are not heavy, because everything that 
hath been begotten of God conquereth 
the world. And this is the conquest 
that conquered the world—our faith. 
Who is he that conquereth the world 
but he that hath faith that Jesus is the 
Son of God?” 


Vv. 1-2. A reiteration of the doctrine 
that love for God = love for the brethren. 
Where either is, the other is also. Love 
for God is the inner principle, love for 
the brethren its outward manifestation. 
The argument is ‘‘an irregular Sorites ” 
(Plummer) :— 


Every one that hath faith in the 
Incarnation is a child of God; 
Every child of God loves the Father ; 
Ὁ every one that hath faith in the 
Incarnation loves God. 
Every one that hath faith in the 
Incarnation loves God; 
Every one that loves God loves the 
children of God; 
-’. every one that hath faith in the 
Incarnation loves the children 
of God. 


These are the two commandments of 
God, the fundamental and all-embracing 
Christian duties—love God and love the 
brotherhood. And faith in the Incarna- 
tion (ὅτι ᾿Ιησοῦς ἐστιν ὁ Χριστός) is an 
inspiration for both. 

πιστεύων corresponds to πίστις (ver. 
4). The lack of a similar correspondence 
in English is felt here as in many other 
passages (e.g., Matt. viii. 10, 13; ix. 28, 
29). Latinis similarly defective: “ omnis 
qui credit,” “fides nostra”. 

Ver. 3. ay. τ. Θεοῦ, here objective 
genitive; contrast ii. 5. iva ecbatic (see 


194 ΙΩΑΝΟΥ A 1 


f Matt. xi. δισ δ - a aif Ss ‘ ela a > el i 
28-30. w8TOu rape per kat ‘at ἐντολαὶ αὐτοῦ βαρεῖαι οὐκ εἰσίν. 4. ὅτι 
£ i. is ohn & , 3 ~ ~ 1) aN , Ἂ ‘ cr 3 Ν 

τ J πᾶν τὸ * γεγεννημένον ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ, νικᾷ τὸν κόσμον ᾿ καὶ αὕτη ἐστὶν 

2 3 


ἣν. efi 
jou ΡῈ ἡ νίκη 7 νικήσασα τὸν κόσμον, ἣ ner ‘Laci 


33: 
ΚΝεγ. 1 ref. 


1 Heb. ix. Θεοῦ ; 
Il, 12. 


mJobn xix. 6, Οὗτός ἐστιν 6 ἐλθὼν ᾿ δι᾿ πὸ ὕδατος Kal αἵματος,5 Ἰησοῦς ὁ 
34. 


Pe ss ς 
5. τις ἐστιν “0 


νικῶν τὸν κόσμον, εἰ μὴ ὃ πιστεύων ὅτι *"Incots ἐστιν ὃ υἱὸς ὁ τοῦ 


6 


'Punct. εἰσιν; ott edd. 2 npwv NABKP, Vg., edd. ; vpwv L, Aeth. 


ὅτις ἐστιν AL, Vg., Sah., Tisch., Nest.; τις ἐστι δε Β, WH (δὲ brack.); Syrve 
quis enim, Aeth. et quis. 

4 © χριστος o vios two minusc., Arm. 

ὅκαι aparos BKL, Syrvs, Vg., Tert. (de Bapt., 16: venerat enim per aquam et 
sanguinem, sicut Toannes scripsit), edd.; add. kav πνευματος SSAP, many minusc., 
Syrph, Cop. ., Sah. 

®o om. SABL, Arm., edd. 


Moulton’s Gram. of N. T. Gk., i. pp. of God” (ver. 1). So now he asks: 
206-9), where the classical idiom would ‘Who is he that conquereth the world 
require τὸ ἡμᾶς τηρεῖν. Cf. John xvii.3; but he that hath faith that Jesus is the 
Luke i. 43. τὰς évt., the two command- Son of God?” (“Son of God” being 
ments— love God” and ‘‘love one an- synonymous with ‘“ Christ,” i.e. “‘ Mes- 
other” (cf. iii. 23, where see note; iv. 21). siah”. Cf. John xi. 27, xx. 31). His 
καὶ αἱ ἐντ., κιτολ. : of. Herm. Past. doctrine therefore is that faith in the 
M. xii. 4, 8 4: οἱ δὲ ἐπὶ τοῖς χείλεσιν Incarnation, believing apprehension of 
ἔχοντες TOV κύριον, τὴν δὲ καρδίαν αὐτῶν the wonder and glory of it, makes easy 
πεπωρωμένην, καὶ μακρὰν ὄντες ἀπὸ τοῦ the commandments of God, 7.6., love to 
κυρίου, ἐκείνοις αἱ ἐντολαὶ αὗται σκληραί God and love to one another. The re- 
εἰσι καὶ Sse Aug. In ¥oan. Ev. membrance and contemplation of that 


Tract. xlviii. x: “ Nostis enim qui amat amazing manifestation drive out the 
non laborat. Omnis enim labor non affection of the world and inflame the 
amantibus gravis est.’ heart with heavenly love. ‘‘ What else 


Ver. 4. The reason why “ His com- can the consideration of a compas:ion 
mandments are not heavy”. Punctuate so great and undeserved, of a love so 
οὐκ εἰσίν, ὅτι πᾶν, «.t.A. The neut. free and in such wise proved, of a con- 
(πᾶν τὸ yey.) expresses the universality descension so unexpected, of a gentleness 
of the principle, “ driickt die unbedingte so unconquerable, of a sweetness so 
Allgemeinheit noch starker aus als ‘Jeder, amazing—what, I say, can the diligent 
der aus Gott geboren ist’” (Rothe). Cf. consideration of these things do but 
John iii. 6. τὸν κόσμον, the sum of all deliver utterly from every evil passion 
the forces antagonistic to the spiritual the soul of him that considers them and 
life. ‘Our faith” conquers the world hale it unto them in sorrow, exceedingly 
by clinging to the eternal realities. affect it, and make it despise in compari- 
‘‘Every common day, he who would be_ son with them whatsoever can be desired 
a live child of the living has to fight the only in their despite?” (Bern. De Dilig. 
God-denying look of things, to believe Deo). ‘‘ There is no book so efficacious 
that, in spite of their look, they are towards the instructing of a man in all 
God’s, and God is in them, and work- all virtue and in abhorrence of all sin as 
ing his saving will in them” (Geo. the Passion of the Son of God” (Juan de 
MacDonald, Castle Warlock, xli.). St. Avila). ‘ Fix your eyes on your Crucified 
John says first ‘is conquering ” (νικᾷ) Lord, and everything will seem easy to 


because the fight is in progress, then uu”? (Santa Teresa). 
“that conquered ” (ἣ νικήσασα) because Vv. 6-8. The Threefold Testimony to 
the triumph is assured. the Incarration. ‘* This is Hethat came 


Ver. 5. St. John says: “ Everything \ through water and blood, Jesus Christ ; 
that hath been begotten of God con- }not in the water only, but in the water 
quereth the world”. But he has already / and in the blood. And it is the Spirit 
said: ‘‘ Every one that hath faith that/ that tes‘ifieth, because the Spirit is the 
Jesus is the Christ hath been begotten| Truth. Because three are they that 


4—8. IQANOY A 195 


n ili. 18, 
o Phil. 11. 


4 ~ - ~ > 
καὶ TO πνεῦμά ἐστι °TS μαρτυροῦν ὅτι TO πνεῦμά ἐστιν " ἡ “ ἀλήθεια. Α ᾿Ξ rhe 


Χριστός * οὐκ ™ ἐν τῷ ὕδατι μόνον, GAN ἐν τῷ ὕδατι kai! τῷ αἵματι" 


a ~ A ~ ΄ - rf 
7. ὅτι τρεῖς 2 εἰσιν ot μαρτυροῦντες ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ, ὁ Πατήρ, ὁ Λόγος, 4 ἰ- 6 ret. 
4 7 o - δ Ν a ε ~ ov > ‘ lta) 
καὶ τὸ Ἅγιον Πνεῦμα ᾿ καὶ οὗτοι οἱ τρεῖς ἕν εἰσι. 8- Kal τρεῖς 


ε ~ ~ nm & ~ A 
εἶσιν οἱ μαρτυροῦντες ἐν τῇ γῇ." TO πνεῦμα, καὶ τὸ ὕδωρ, καὶ τὸ 


1 καὶ εν ABLP, edd. 2 οι τρεις KY. 

3 ev τω OVpavw. . . ev TH yy ἃ Latin interpolation, certainly spurious. (1) Found 
in no Gk. MS. except two late minuscules—162 (Vatican), 15th c., the Lat. Vg. 
Version with a Gk. text adapted thereto; 34 (Trin. Coll., Dublin), 16th c. (2) 
Quoted by none of the Gk. Fathers. Had they known it, they would have employed 
it in the Trinitarian controversies (Sabellian and Arian). (3) Found in none of the 
early versions—in Vg. but not as it left the hands of St. Jerome. (4) Quoted by no 
Latin weiter until Priscillian (close of qth c.). Apparet igitur ... verba quae 
de tribus testibus caelestibus dici solent nullam prorsus fidem, auctoritatem nullam 
habere, nec a gravi libidinis aut imprudentiae crimine liberari posse cos qui etiam- 
num, falsa quippe pretate ducti, libris sacris obtrudi patiuntur. . . . Lrror vero 
longe est gravissimus, si qui, quod de sancta trinitate ecclesia Christi praecepit, a 
verbis illis Fohanni obtrusis vel maxime pendere opinati sunt (Tisch.). 


testify—the Spirit and the water and /Christ,” one person in opposition to the 
ἔπε blood, and the three are for the one {Cerinthian “dissolution” (λύσις) of Jesus 
end.” and Christ (seenote oniv. 3). ἐν: Henot 
St. John has said that faith in the In- \only “came through” but continued ‘‘in 
carnation makes the commandments e water and in the blood,” i.e., His 
easy, and now the question arises: How ministry comprehended both*the Baptism 
can we be assured that the Incarnation of the Spirit and the Sacrifice for sin. 
_is a fact? He adduces a threefold at- Rerhaps, however, the prepositions are 
: testation: the Spirit, the water and the imterchangeable; cf. 2 Cor. vi. 4-8; Heb. 
‘blood. His meaning is clear when it is jx. 12, 25. %aA%6.: Jesus called Him- 
{understood that he has the Cerinthian /self ‘‘the Truth ” (John xiv. 6), and the 
heresy (see Introd. pp. 156 f.) in-View and / Spirit came in His room, His alter ego 
tates his doctrine in opposition to it.{ (vv. 16-18). 
erinthus distinguished between Jesus\~—Vv-7-8. The Water (the Lord’s con- 
nd the Christ. The divine Christ ‘Secrated Life) and the Blood (His sacri- 
escended upon the human Jesus at the ficial Death) are testimonies to the Incar- 
/ Baptism, i.e., He “came through water,” mation, but they are insufficient. A third 
and left him at the Crucifixion, t.e., He testimony, that of the Spirit, is needed 
did not “‘come through blood”. Thus to reveal their significance to us and 
redemption was excluded; all that was bringit home toourhearts. Without His 
needed was spiritual illumination. In enlightenment the wonder and glory of 
opposition to this St. John declares that that amazing manifestation \ ill be hidden 
the Eternal God was incarnate in Jesus {romus. It will be as unintelligible to 
and was manifested in the entire course us as “ mathematics to a Scythian boor, 
of His human life, not only at His Bap- and music toacamel”. τρεῖς οἱ μαρτυ- 
tism, which was His consecration to His ροῦντες, masculine though Πνεῦμα, ὕδωρ, 
ministry of redemption, butat His Death, and αἷμα are all neuter, because agrecing 
which was the consummation of Hisin- κατὰ σύνεσιν with τὸ Mvetpa—a testi- 
finite Sacrifice: ‘through water and mony, the more striking because involun- 
blood, not in the water only but in the tary, to the personality of the Spirit. 
water and in the blood”. eis τὸ ἕν, “ ior the one end,” i.e. to bring 
Ver. 6. οὗτος, i.e., this Jesus who is_ us to faith in the Incarnation (ὅτι Ἰησοῦς 
the Son of God, the Messiah whom the ἐστιν ὁ Υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ). This was the 
prophets foretold and who “came” in end for which St. John wrote his Gospel 
the fulness of the time. ὁ ἐλθών, not (John xx. 31). There is no reference in 
6 ἐρχόμενος. His Advent no longer an the Water and the Blood cither to the 
unfulfilled hope but an historic event. effusion of blood and water fiom the 
διά, of the pathway or vehicle of His Lord’s picrced side (John xix. 34) or to 
Advent. “Incots Χριστός, ‘Jesus the two Sacraments. 


: 
} 


196 


r John xi. 
52, XVii. 


23. 
s John v. 


IQANOY A 


e e A ε ia) en x J 3 
αιμα και OL τρεις “Eig TO εν εἰσιν. 


Vv. 


9. Et τὴν μαρτυρίαν τῶν 


5» tA , ε , A A 4 5 Beh ABD o 
ἀνθρώπων λαμβάνομεν, ἡ μαρτυρία τοῦ Θεοῦ μείζων ἐστίν " ὅτι αὕτη 


31:37), vill. ἐστὶν "ἡ μαρτυρία τοῦ Θεοῦ, iv? μεμαρτύρηκε περὶ τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτοῦ. 


t John v. 
26; Heb 
viii. 16, x. 6 
16 (Jer. 


c , > 1 cn Lol Θ A » x ’ t > ε ~ ax 

IO. ὁ πιστεύων εἰς τὸν ULOV TOU Θεου, EXEL THY μαρτυρίαν © ἐν EaUTw 

Σ Χ , OER 3 ἂψ , , δι τος ἂν > , 
μὴ πιστεύων τῷ VEL, εὐστὴν πεποιήηκεν αὕτον, OTL OU πεπίσ- 


xxxi. 33). τευκεν εἰς τὴν μαρτυρίαν, ἣν μεμαρτύρηκεν ὃ Θεὸς περὶ τοῦ υἱοῦ 


u i. 10. ΣΥΝ 

vi.2; John αὕτου. 
v. 26. ΜᾺ 

w John iii. ἡμῖν ὁ 
B67 Corse, 


ΠΡῚΝ να, σ᾽ ε a 3 rer > A> 
Θεός ᾿ καὶ ἡ αὕτη ἢ ζωὴ ἐν τῷ υἱῷ αὐτοῦ ἐστιν. 


Ἀ oe > ‘ ε , τε ‘ ae 2 
11. Καὶ αὕτη ἐστὶν ἡ μαρτυρία ὅτι ζωὴν αἰώνιον ἔδωκεν 


12. “ὁ ἔχων 


2 ce 3, x PS Se x. > SN ει a A x‘ AY > 
iii. 21-23. τὸν υἱόν, ἔχει THY ζωήν ᾿ ὃ μὴ ἔχων τὸν υἱὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ, THY ζωὴν οὐκ 


” 
εχει. 


1mv KLP; ott ΑΒ, ΝΕ. (testimonium Dei, quod majus est, quoniam testificatus 


est), Cop., Sah., Arm., edd. 


Punct. o Ti. 


*eavtw S$; avtw ABKLP; αὐτῷ Tisch., WH (marg.), Nest.; αὑτῷ WH. 
3 tw θεω SSBKLP, Syrvg, Cop., edd. ; tw viw A, Syrph, Vg. 


Vv. 9-12. Our attitude to the Three- 
fold Testimony. “1 we receive the 
testimony of men, the testimony of God 
is greater, because this is the testimony 
of God—what He hath testified concern- 
ing His Son. He that believeth in the 
Son of God hath the testimony in him- 
self. He that believeth not God hath 
made Him a liar, because he hath not 
believed in the testimony which God 
hath testified concerning His Son. And 
this is the testimony, that God gave us 
life eternal; and this life is in His Son. 
He that hath the Son hati the life; he 
that hath not the Son of God the life 
hath not.” 

Ver. 9. According to the Jewish law 
threefold testimony was valid (Deut. xix. 
15; cf. Matt. xvili. 16; John viii. 17-18). 
Read (as in iii. 20) 6, τι μεμαρτύρηκεν, 
‘‘what He hath testified concerning His 
Son,” i.e. the testimony of His miracles 
and especially His Resurrection (Rom. 
i. 4). The variant ἥν is a marginal gloss 
indicating the relative (6, τι), not the 
conjunction (ὅτι). The latter is incap- 
able of satisfactory expianation. The 
alternatives are: (1) ‘‘ Because the te ti- 
mony of God is this—the fact that He 
hath testified,” which is meaningless and 
involves an abrupt variation in the use of 
ὅτι. (2) ““ Because this is the testimony 
of God, because, I say, He hath testi- 
fied,” which is intolerable. The Apostle 
appeals here to his readers τὸ be as 
reasonable with God as with their fellow 
men. Cf. Pascal: ‘* Would the heir to 
an estate on finding the title-deeds say, 
‘Perhaps they are false’? and would he 
neglect to examine them ?” 

Ver.10. A subtle and profound analy- 


sis of the exercise of soul which issues. 
in assured faith. Three stages: (1) ‘ Be- 
lieve God” (πιστεύειν τῷ Θεῷ, credere 
Deo), accept His testimony concerning 
His Son, i.e., not simply His testimony 
at the Baptism (Matt. iii. 17) but the 
historic manifestation of God in Christ, 
the Incarnation. God speaks not by 
words but by acts, and to set aside His 
supreme act, and all the forces which it 
has set in operation is to ‘make Him a 
liar” by treating His historic testimony 
as unworthy of credit. (2) “" Believe in 
the Son of God” (πιστεύειν εἰς τὸν Υἱὸν" 
τοῦ Θεοῦ, credere in Filium Dei), make 
the believing self-surrender which is the 
reasonable and inevitable consequence of 
contemplating the Incarnation and reco2- 
nising the wonder of it. (3) The Inward 
Testimony (τὴν μαρτυρίαν ἐν αὐτῷ, 
testimonium in seipso). ‘ Fecisti nos ad 
te, et inquietum est cor nostrum donec 
requiescat in te” (Aug.). The love of 
Jesus satisfies the deepest need of our 
nature. When He is welcomed, the 
soul rises up and greets Him as ‘“‘all its 
salvation and all its desire,” and the 
testimony is no longer external in history 
but an inward experience (cf. note on 
iv.Q: ἐν rpiv), and therefore indubitable. 
These three stages are, according to the 
metaphor of Rev. iii. 20, (1) hearing the 
Saviour’s voice, (2) opening the door, (3) 
communion. 

Ver. 11. The Testimony of the Incar- 
nation. Cf.i.2. ἔδωκεν, “ gave,” aorist 
referring to a definite historic act, the 
Incarnation. 

Ver. 12. μή with the participle does 
not necessarily make the case hypothetical 
(cf. note on ii. 4). St. John would have 


g—16. 


A ” ea a , 3 , Ἢ a © Ax 
13. Ταῦτα ἔγραψα ὕμιν τοῖς πιστεύουσιν εἰς TO ὄνομα TOU υἱοῦ 


IQANOY A 


197 


ii. 12 reff., 
ili. 23. 


-“ ~ ~ 4 - , Ὲ 
τοῦ Θεοῦ,͵ ἵνα εἰδῆτε ὅτι ζωὴν ἔχετε αἰώνιον, καὶ ἵνα πιστεύητε ὅὙ John Xx 


εἰς τὸ “ὄνομα ἢ τοῦ υἱοῦ τοῦ Θεοῦ. 


> , See ὦ 
GQKOUEL ἡμῶὼν 


> > > a 
μεθα, οἴδαμεν ὅτι ἔχομεν τὰ ὃ αἰτήματα ἃ ἠτήκαμεν παρ᾽ * αὐτοῦ. 


14. 
> “A 
ἣν ἔχομεν πρὸς αὐτόν, ὅτι * ἐάν τι αἰτώμεθα κατὰ > τὸ θέλημα αὐτοῦ, 


- aa,,3 
15. καὶ ° ἐὰν οἴδαμεν OTL ἀκούει ἡμῶν, ὃ ἂν 


Nee ϑυτὶν Zz (α Z il. 28 reff. 
Kat αὕτη ἐστὶν ἢ * παρρησία 2 i: ay 
John xiv. 
13, XVi. 
23. 
b Matt. vi. 
10; Luke 
XXli. 42. 


pis 
αιτω- 


16. Ἐάν τις ἴδῃ τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ “ ἁμαρτάνοντα ἁμαρτίαν μὴ πρὸς ς C/. : 


111. 8 (ἐὰν στήκετε). 
i, 18; 2 Tim. iv. 7; Col. ii. 19; 1 Peter iii. 14. 


d Luke xxiii. 24; Phil. iv. 6. 


_, Thess. 
e ii. 25; Mark iv. 41 ; John vii. 24; 1 Tim. 


‘Tous πιστευουσιν εἰς TO ονομα Tov υἱου Tov θεου KLP; om. ΑΒ, Syrve Ph, 


Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., edd. 


2 kata πιστευητε KLP; τοις πιστευουσιν SQ*B, Syrve ph, edd. ; ot πιστευοντες 


NA. 
3 eav SQLP,edd. 


only too many actual instances before 
him in those days of doctrinal unsettle- 
ment. 

Vv. 13-21. The Epistle is finished, 
and the Apostle now speaks his closing 
words. ‘‘ These things I wrote to you 
that ye may know that ye have eternal 
life, even to you that believe in the name 
of the Son of God. And this is the bold- 
ness which we have toward Him, that it 
we request anything according to His 
will, He hearkenetn to us. And if we 
know that He hearkeneth to us whatever 
we request, we know that we have the 
requests which we have made from Him. 
If any one see his brother sinning a sin 
not unto death, he shall make request, 
and he will give to him life, even to them 
that are sinning not unto death. There 
is a sin unto death; not concerning that 
do I say that he should ask. Every sort 
of unrighteousness is sin, and there is a 
sin not unto death. We know that every 
one that hath been begotten of God doth 
not keep sinning, but the Begotten of 
God observeth him, and the Evil One 
doth not lay holdon him. We know that 
we are of God, and the whole world lieth 
in the Evil One. And we know that the 
Son of God hath come, and hath given 
us understanding that we may get to 
know the True One; and we are in the 
True One, in His Son Jesus Christ. 
This is the True God and Life Eternal. 
Little children, guard yourselves from the 
idols.” 

Ver. 13. The purpose for which St. 
John wrote his Gospel was that we 
might believe in the Incarnation, and so 
have Eternal Life (xx. 31); the purpose 
of the Epistle is not merely that we may 
have Eternal Life by believing but that 
we may know that we have it. The 
Gospel exhibits the Son of God, the 


VOL. V. 


ἅπαρ AKLP; aw NB, edd. 


Epistle commends Him. It is a supple- 
ment to the Gospel, a personal applica- 
tion and appeal. ἔγραψα, “1 wrote,” 
looking back on the accomplished task. 
εἰδῆτε, “know,” not γινώσκητε, “get to 
know”. Full and present assurance. 

Ver. 14. παρρησία, see note on ii, 28. 
As distinguished from αἰτεῖν the middle 
αἰτεῖσθαι is to pray earnestly as witha 
personal interest (see Mayor’s note on 
James iv. 3). The distinction does not 
appear her>, since αἰτεῖν αἰτήματα (cog- 
nate accusitive) is a colourless periphrasis 
for αἰτεῖσθαι. A large assurance : our 
prayers always heard, never unanswered. 
Observe two limitations: (1) κατὰ τὸ 
θέλημα αὐτοῦ, which does not mean that 
we should first ascertain His will and 
then pray, but that we should pray with 
the proviso, exp:ess or implicit, “If it be 
Thy will”. Matt. xxvi. 39 is the model 
prayer. (2) The promise is not ‘He 
granteth it” but ‘‘ He hearkeneth to us”’. 
He answers in His own way. 


Ver. 15. An amplification of the 
second limitation. ‘We have our re- 
quests ” not always as we pray but as 


we would pray were we wiser. God 
gives not what we ask but what we 
really need. Cf. Shak., Ant. and Cleop. 
I. 11. :— . 
‘‘ We, ignorant of ourselves, 
Beg often our own harms, which the wise 
powers 

Deny us for our good; so find we profit, 
By losing of our prayers”. 


Prayer is not dictation to God but ἀνά- 
βασις vod πρὸς Θεὸν καὶ αἴτησις τῶν 
προσηκόντων παρὰ Θεοῦ (Joan. Damasc. 
De. Fid. Orthod., iii. 24). Clem. Alex. : 
‘** Non absolute dixit quod petierimus sed 
quod oportet petere ᾿ 

Ver. 16. After the grand assurance 


13 


198 


f Matt. xiii. 94 
332; θάνατον, 


Heb. vi. θάνατον. 
4:6. TENGE 
g ili. 4. : 
Sree CO ia eh al 


i John xvii. πρὸς θάνατον. 


Καὶ. 13 reff. οὐχ ἁμαρτάνει " ἀλλ᾽ ὃ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ, ἱ τηρεῖ EauTdy,! καὶ 


IQANOY A 


V. 


> , Ν , > ~ , a < f Ν Ν 
αἰτήσει, καὶ δώσει αὐτῷ ζωήν, τοῖς ἁμαρτάνουσι μὴ πρὸς 
” z ΄ Ν , . > a ie , ΄ oe 
ἔστιν ἡ ἁμαρτία πρὸς θάνατον " οὐ περὶ ἐκείνης λέγω ἵνα 

g A ἀδ , ec , é Lary (oe ε , > 

17. πᾶσα ἀδικία ἁμαρτία éoti* Kal ἔστιν ἁμαρτία οὐ 

18. Οἴδαμεν ὅτι ἢ πᾶς ὁ γεγεννημένος ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ, 


ΕΟ 


lauvrov A*B, Vg. (generatio Dei conservat eum), edd. 


that prayer is always heard, never un- 
answered, the Apostle specifies one kind 
of prayer, viz., Intercession, in the par- 
ticular case of a ‘‘ brother,” i.e. a fellow- 
believer, who has sinned. Prayer will 
avail for his restoration, with one reserva- 
tion—that his sin be “not unto death”. 
The reference is to those who had been 
led astray by the heresy, moral and intel- 
lectual, which had invaded the churches 
of Asia Minor (see Introd. pp. 156 f.) They 
had closed their ears to the voice of Con- 
science and their eyes to the light of the 
Truth, and they were exposed to the 
operation of that law of Degeneration 
which obtains in the physical, moral, in- 
tellectual, and spiritual domains. £.g., 
a bodily faculty, if neglected, atrophics 
(cf. note on 11. rr). Sointhe moral do- 
raain disregard ot truth destroys veracity. 
Acts make habits, habits character. So 
also in the intellectual domain. Cf. 
Darwin to Sir J. D. Hooker, June 17, 
1868: “1 am glad you were at the 
Messiah, it is the one thing that I should 
like to hear again, but I daresay I should 
find my soul too dried up to appreciate it 
as in old days; and then I should feel 
yery flat, for it is a horrid bore to feel as 
I constantly do, that I am a withered 
leaf for every subject except Science”. 
And so in the spiritual domain. There 
are two ways of killing the soul : (1) The 
benumbing and hardening practice of 
disregarding spiritual appeals and stifling 
spiritual impulses. Cf. Relig. Baxter, 1. 
i. 29: ‘* Bridgnorth had made me resolve 
that I would never go among a People 
that had been hardened in unprofitable- 
ness under an awakening Ministry; but 
either to such as had never had any 
convincing Preacher, or to such as had 
profited by him”. (2) A. decisive apos- 
.asy, a deliberate rejection. This was 
the case of those heretics. They had 
ab ured Christ and followed Antichrist. 
This is what Jesus calls 4 τοῦ Mvev- 
ματος βλασφημία (Matt. xii. 31-32 = 
Mark iii. 28-30). It inflicts a mortal 
wound on the man’s spiritual nature. He 
can never be forgiven because he can 
never repent. He is ‘“‘in the grip ofan 


eternal sn (ἔνοχος αἰωνίου dua a- 
tos)”. Cf. Heb. vi. 4-6. This ree 
unto death”’. Observe how tenderly St. 
John speaks: There is a fearful possi- 
bility of a man putting himself beyond 
the hope of restoration; but we can 
never tell when he has crossed the bound- 
ary. If we were sure that it was a case 
of “sin unto dea h,” then we should for- 
bear praying; but, since we can never be 
sure, we should always keep on praying. 
So long as a man is capable of repent- 
ance, he has not sinned unto death. 
**Quamdiu enim veniz relinquitur locus, 
mors prorsus imperium nondum occupat ” 
(Calv.). δώσει, either (1) “ he (the inter- 
cessor) will give to him (the brother),” 
τοῖς ἅμαρτ. being in apposition to αὐτῷ, 
‘*to him, i.e. to them that, etc.” ; or (2) 
“Ἢ 8 (God) will give to him (the inter- 
cessor) life for them that, etc.” The 
former avoids an abrupt change of sub- 
ject, and the attribution to the intercessor 
of what God does through him is paral- 
leled by James v. 20. 

Ver. 17. A gentle warning. “ Princi- 
piis obsta.” Also a reassurance. ‘ You 
have sinned, but not necessarily ‘ unto 
death’.” 

Vv. 18-20. The Certainties of Christian 
Faith. St. John has been speaking of a 
dark mystery, and now he turns from it: 
‘“Do not brood over it. Think rather of 
the splendid certainties and rejoice in 
them.” 

Ver. 18. Our Security through the 
Guardianship of Christ. οὐχ ἁμαρτάνει, 
see note on ili. 6. The child of God may 
tall into sin, but he does not continue in 
it; he is not under its dominion. Why? 
Because, though he has a malignant 
foe, he has also a vigilant Guardian. 
ὃ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ, i.¢e., Christ. 
Cf. Symb. Nic. : Κύριον ᾿Ιησοῦν Χριστὸν, 
τὸν Υἱὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ, γεννηθέντα ἐκ τοῦ 
Πατρὸς. As distinguished from γεγεννη- 
μένος the aor. γεννήθεις refers to the 
“Eternal Generation”. The rendering 
“he that is begotten of God (the regen- 
erate man) keepeth himself (ἑαυτὸν), 
qui genitus est ex Deo, servat setpsum 
(Calv.), is doubly objectionable: G) It 


17—2I. 


πονηρὸς οὐχ | ἅπτεται αὐτοῦ. 
καὶ ὁ κόσμος ὅλος " ἐν * 


τοῦ Θεοῦ " ἥκει, καὶ δέδωκεν ἡμῖν διάνοιαν ἵνα " γινώσκωμεν | 
« ΑΗ κι Paks > ~ q2 A > a εκ 3 ~ 2 a 

ἀληθινόν ᾿ καί ἐσμεν ἐν TO “ ἀληθινῷ, ἐν τῷ υἱῷ αὐτοῦ ᾿Ιησοῦ 
Χριστῷ" οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ 7 ἀληθινὸς Θεός, καὶ " ἡ 2 ζωὴ αἰώνιος. 
Τεκνία, * φυλάξατε ἑαυτοὺς ὅ ἀπὸ τῶν * εἰδώλων. 


ri.2. 


q ii. 8. 
t 1 Cor. x.14; Eph. ν. 5. 


i. 12, 14. 


IQANOY A 


199 


19. οἴδαμεν ὅτι "' ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐσμεν, ! Luke vii. 


14, 39; 


τῷ πονηρῷ κεῖται. 20. οἴδαμεν δὲ ὅτι ὁ υἱὸς John xx. 
t ‘ 17. 


ὃν πὶ ili. 8. 

bg n Luke ii. 
12, 16. 

o John viii. 
42. 

P (-opev) £ 
Cor. iv.6; 
Gal.iv.17. 


21. 
ἀμήν." 


s Luke xii. 15; John xii. 25, xvii. 12; 2 Thess. iii. 3; 1 Tim. vi. 20; 2 Tim. 


1 γινωσκομεν SAB*LP, edd.—an itacism. 


24 om. NAB, edd. 


3 eavtous KCAKP ; εαὐτα $Q*BL, edd. 


αμην KLP, Vg.; om. SAB, Syrvg ph, Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., edd. A common 


ecclesiastical addition. 


ignores the distinction between perf. 
and aor.; (2) there is no comfort in the 
thought that we are in our own keeping ; 
our security is not our grip on Christ but 
His grip onus. Calvin feels this: ‘‘ Quod 
Dei proprium est, ad nos transfert. Nam 
Si quisque nostrum salutis suz sit custos, 
miserum erit presidium”. Vulg. has 
generatio Dei, perhaps representing a 
variant 4 γέννησις τοῦ Θεοῦ. τηρεῖ, 
see note on ii. 3. ἅπτεται, stronger than 
“toucheth,” rather “ graspeth,” ‘‘layeth 
hold of”. A reference to Ps. cv. (LXX 
Civ.). 15: μὴ ἅψησθε τῶν χριστῶν pov, 
Nolite tangere christos meos (Vulg.). 

Ver. 19. Our Security in God’s Em- 
brace. ὁ κόσμος: ‘Non creatura sed 
seculares nomines et secundum concupis- 
centias viventes” (Clem. Alex.). See note 
On il. 15. τῷ πονηρῷ, masc. as in prev. 
vers. κεῖται, in antithesis to οὐχ ἅπτεται. 
On the child of God the Evil One does 
not so much as lay his hand, the world 
lies in his arms. On the other hand, the 
child of God lies in God’s arms. Cf. 
Deut. xxxiii. 27. Penn, Fruits of Solit- 
tude: “If our Hairs fall not to the 
Ground, less do we or our Substance 
without God’s Providence. Nor can we 
fall below the arms of God, how low so- 
ever it be we fall.” 

Ver. 20. The Assurance and Guarantee 
of it all—the fact of the Incarnation (ὅτι 
ὁ Υἱὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ ἥκει), an overwhelming 
demonstration of God’s interest in us and 
His concern for our highest good. Not 
simply a historic fact but an abiding 


operation—not “ came (qAGe),” but “hath 
come and hath givenus”. Our faith is 
not a matter of intellectual theory but 
of personal and growing acquaintance 
with God through the enlightenment of 
Christ's Spirit. τὸν ἀληθινόν, “ the real ” 
as opposed to the false God of the here- 
tics. See note onii. 8. ἐν τῷ ἀληθινῷ, 
as the world is ἐν τῷ πονηρῷ. 

Ver. 21. Filioli, custodite vos a simu- 
lacris (Vulg.). The exhortation arises 
naturally. ‘ This”—this God revealed 
and made near and sure in Christ—‘‘is 
the True God and Life Eternal. Cleave 
to Him, and do not take to do with false 
Gods: guard yourselves from the idols.” 
St. John is thinking, not of the heathen 
worship of Ephesus—Artemis and her 
Temple, but of the heretical substitutes 
for the Christian conception of God. 
τεκνία gives a tone of tenderness to 
the exhortation. φυλάσσειν is used of 
‘“ suarding” a flock (Luke ii. 8), a deposit 
or trust (1 Tim. vi. 20; 2 Tim. i. 12, 14), 
a prisoner (Acts xii. 4). φυλάσσειν, 
“watch from within” ; τηρεῖν (see note 
on ii. 3), “watch from without”. Thus, 
when a city is besieged, the garrison 
φυλάσσουσι, the besiegers τηροῦσιν. 
The heart is a citadel, and it must be 
guarded against insidious assailants from 
without. Not φυλάσσετε, “be on your 
guard,” but φυλάξατε, aor. marking a 
crisis. The Cerinthian heresy was a 
desperate assault demanding a decisive 
repulse. 


IVANNOY ΤΟΥ 


AITOZTOAOY. 


ENHISTOAH KA@®OAIKH AEYTEPA.! 


as eens 
1 Tim 


aS 0) ΠΡΕΣΒΎΤΕΡΟΣ sila | κυρίᾳ 2 


7 a π᾿ τ a 
καὶ τοῖς τέκνοις αὐτῆς, OUS 


Ι, 17, I ; 
Here τὸ ἐγὼ 7 a Ὁ ἐν ἀληθείᾳ, καὶ οὐκ ἐγὼ μόνος, ἀλλὰ καὶ πάντες οἱ 


“Ὁ ΤῈΣ Ἢ 2 
2; τ Peter ἐγνωκότες hv ἀλήθειαν, 2. διὰ ἢ 


Ὁ John xvii. καὶ 
17, 10. 
c i John ii. 


4, 14, 24, 27, iii. 9. d 1 John iv. 17. 


liwavvou B S$; twavov B B; emorod 
Sevtepa 99; twavvov επιστολη καθολικη 
Lwavvov Tov θεολογου επιστολη Sevtepa L ; 
εἐπιστολη Sevtepa Lwavvou Tou ἐπὶ στηθους 4. 


ἐπιστολὴ δευτερα 5 ; 


d θ᾽ εἴτα, oe 3 x IA Ξ » 4 
pel ημῶν εσται εἰς TOV αἰῶνα ᾿ 3. εσται 


τὴν ἀλήθειαν τὴν “ μένουσαν ὃ ἐν ἡμῖν, 
μεθ᾽ ἡμῶν > © χάρις, 


er Tim. i. 2; 2 Tim. i. 2. 


Lwayvou B P, 96; wwavvov καθολικη 
K, ror, 106; του αγιου αποστολου 
του αὐτου αγιου Lwavvou Tov θεολογου 


τη εκλεκτη κυρια 73; εκλεκτη TH κυρια 31; ekAeKTH TH και κυρια Aeth.; 


Κυρίᾳ Syrvg ph, Tisch. ; 


᾿Ἐκλέκτῃ Κυρίᾳ WH (marg.). 


3 μενουσαν SBKLP, Vg., edd.; ενοικουσαν A. 


teorar Se 15, 36, Euth. Zig. 


ὅημων SBLP, Syrbo, Sah., Aeth., edd. ; upwv K, Vg. (sit vobiscum gratia), Cop., 


Syrph, 


THE SECOND EPISTLE. 

Vv. 1-3. The Address. ‘ The Elder to 
elect Kyria and her children, whom I 
love in Truth, and not I alone but also all 
that have got to know the Truth, because 
of the Truth that abideth in us; and with 
us it shall be for ever. Yea, there shall 
be with us grace, mercy, peace from God 
the Father and from Jesus Christ the Son 
of the Father in Truth and love.” 


Ver. 1. 6 πρεσβύτερος, see Introd. 
pp. 159 ff. ἐκλεκτῇ Κυρίᾳ, see Introd. 
pp- 162 f. οὕς, constructio κατὰ σύνεσιν, 


because τὰ τέκνα were or included sons, 
not “weil an Gemeindeglieder gedacht 
ist” (Holtzmann). ἐγώ: according to 
the Greek idiom, when a man speaks of 
himself in the third person, he passes im- 
mediately to the first. Cf. Plat. Euthyphr. 
5 A: οὐδέ τῳ ἂν διαφέροι Εὐθύφρων τῶν 
πολλῶν ἀνθρώπων, εἰ μὴ τὰ τοιαῦτα 
πάντα ἀκριβῶς εἰδείην. Soph. Aj., 864- 
65. The construction is found in ‘loose 
English; cf. Thackeray, Barry Lyndon, 
chap. xvili.: “I was a man who never 
deserved that so much prosperity should 
fall to my share”. ἐν ἀληθείᾳ (see note 
on I John i. 8) defines the Elder’s love for 


Kyria as fellowship in Christian know- 
ledge and faith, in view perhaps of 
heathen accusations of licentiousness. 
His affection for her and her family was 
not merely personal; it was inspired by 
her devotion to the common cause and 
was shared by all the Christians in his 
extensive διοίκησις. Cf. 2 Cor. viii. 18: 
οὗ 6 ἔπαινος ἐν TO εὐαγγελίῳ διὰ πασῶν. 
τῶν ἐκκλησιῶν. τὴν ἀλήθειαν, “the 
Truth just mentioned”. 

Ver. 2. μένουσαν ἐν ἡμῖν, not merely 
apprehended by the intellect but wel- 
comed by the heart. μεθ᾽ ἡμῶν, nobiscum, 
bet uns, as our guest and companion. 

Ver. 3. ἔσται μεθ᾽ ἡμῶν, not a wish 
(x Peter i. 2; 2 Peter i. 2) but a confident 
assurance. χάρις, the well-spring in the 
heart of God; ἔλεος, its outpourings; 
εἰρήνη» its blessed effect. T hey are 
evangelical blessings: (1) not merely 
“from God” but ‘from God the Father 
and from Jesus Christ the Son of the 
Father” who has interpreted Him and 
brought Him near, made Him accessible ; 
(2) not merely “in Truth,” enlightening” 
the intellect, but ‘‘in love,” engaging the 
heart. 


4—0. 


“heos, εἰρήνη παρὰ Θεοῦ πατρός, καὶ παρὰ Kupiou! Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ 
τοῦ υἱοῦ τοῦ πατρός, ἐν ἀληθείᾳ καὶ ἀγάπῃ. 

4. ᾿ ᾽Εχάρην λίαν ὅτι εὕρηκα ἐκ τῶν τέκνων σου * περιπατοῦντας ἐν 
ἀληθείᾳ, καθὼς ἐντολὴν ἐλάβομεν 2 παρὰ τοῦ πατρός. 


ΙΩΑΝΟΥ Β 


201 


Matt. ii. 
10; Mark 
Xiv. II; 
Luke 
xxiii. 8; 
John xx. 
20. 


5. καὶ νῦν : 
gi Johni, 


2 mn rise Sun 9 ς 3 s , 4 ἈΠ ae . ἃ ii. 
ἐρωτῶ σε, kupia,® “obx ὡς ἐντολὴν γράφω ὁ σοι καινήν," ἀλλὰ ἣν ε 7 ii. 6, 


Ψ᾿ > ~ > ~ 
εἴχομεν ὃ am ἀρχῆς, ἵνα ἀγαπῶμεν ἀλλήλους. 
ἡ ἀγάπη, ἵνα * περιπατῶμεν κατὰ τὰς ἐντολὰς αὐτοῦ. 


6. καὶ ᾿ αὕτη ἐστὶν hr John 
ET ee PS σὸ 111; 
αὐτὴ ἐστιν ἢ II, 23. 

ir Johnv 


3 reff. Κι John iii. 23. 


1 «uptov SSKLP, Syrph, Cop., Arm.; om. AB, several minusc., Syrbo, Vg. (a 


Christo ¥esu), Aeth., edd. 
Ξεέλαβον NY. 3 Kupta Tisch. 


4+ ypadw several minusc., Aeth., Arm. ; ypadwv RABKLP, V¢g., edd. 
5 ypadwv σοι καινην BKLP, WH, Nest. ; καινὴν γραφων σοι SQA, Tisch. 


θειχομεν BKLP; εἰχαμεν NA, edd. 


Observe the high tribute which the 
Elder pays to Kyria: (1) He testifies to 
the esteem in which she is held; (2) he 
recognises her as a fellow-worker as 
though she were a fellow-apostle—the 
three-fold “us,” not ‘‘you”; (3) he is 
about to speak of the danger from here- 
tical teaching, but he has no fear of her 
being led astray : ‘‘ You and 1 are secure 
from the deceiver. The Truth abideth in 
us; with us it shall be for ever; yea, there 
shall be with us grace, mercy, peace.” 

Ver. + The Occasion of the Epistle. 
“I was exceedingly glad because I have 
found some of thy children walking in 
Truth, even as we received command- 
ment from the Father.” 

ἐχάρην, of a glad surprise (cf. Mark 
xiv. 11), He had been too often disap- 
pointed in lads like these (see Introd., p. 
155). They had profited by the nurture 
of their godly home, the best equipment 
for the battle of life. ‘‘ No man should 
ever leave money to his children. Itisa 
curse to them. What we should do for 
our children, if we would do them the 
best service we can, is to give them the 
best training we can procure for them, 
and then turn them loose in the world 
without a sixpence to fend for them- 
selves” (Cecil John Rhodes). εὕρηκα, 
“1 have found”. He sits down at once 
and writes to Kyria. How glad she 
would be that her lads, far away in the 
great city were true to their early faith! 
ἐκ τῶν τέκνων, “some of thy children” 
{a tenderer word than “sons,” υἱῶν), 
““members of thy family,” not implying 
that others had done ill; the lads who 
had come to Ephesus. περιπατοῦντας, 
«.7.A., ambulantes in veritate, die in der 
Wahrheit wandeln, “ordering their lives 


according to the precepts of the Gospel”. 
See note on 1 Johni. 6. 

Vv. 5-6. The Comprehensive Com- 
mandment. ‘And now I ask thee; Kyria, 
not as writing a new commandment to 
thee but the one which we had from the 
beginning, that we love one another. 
And this is love—that we walk according 
to His commandments; this is the coni- 
mandment, even as ye heard from the 
beginning—that we should walk in love,” 

These counsels are just a summary of 
the doctrines expounded at large in the 
first Epistle. There is here a sort of 
reasoning in a circle: The commandment 
is Love; Love is walking according to 
His commandments ; His commandments 
are summed up in one—Love. 

Ver. 5. am ἀρχῆς, “from the begin- 
ning of our Christian life”. See note on 
I John ii. 7. 

Ver. 6. ἡ ἀγάπη, “the love just re- 
ferred to”. περιπ. κατὰ Tas ἐντ. αὐτ., 
regulating our lives by their require- 
ments; περιπ. ἐν ἀληθείᾳ (ver. 4), keep- 
ing within the limits of the Christian 
revelation and not straying beyond them 
—not προάγοντες (ver. 9). αὐτῇ; 1.6., 
“love,” not “" the commandment” (Vulg.: 
Hoc est mandatum, ut... in 60 ambu- 
letis). περιπατεῖν ἐν ἀγάπῃ is synony- 
mous with περιπατεῖν ἐν ἀληθείᾳ, since 
Love is Truth in practice. Cf. the story 
of R. Hillel: A mocking Gentile pro- 
mised to become a proselyte if he would 
teach him the whole Law while he stood 
on one foot—a gibe at the multitudinous 
precepts, reckoned at 613. ‘‘ What is 
hateful to thyself,” said the Rabbi, “do 
not to thy neighbour. This is the whole 
Law; the rest is commentary.” Yalk. 
Chad., lix. 2; ‘“‘qui justum cibat frusto, 


202 


11 Johni. 8. 

m 1 John iv. 
trek. 

n 1 John iv. , 


2. 
Οἱ John ii, 


o> , 
ἢ 18 Leases αντίχριστος. 
Ἀν μεθα, ἀλλὰ “ μισθὸν πλήρη ἀπολάβωμεν. 
att. X. 


[QANOY B 


“ , 
Ιησοῦν Χριστὸν ἐρχόμενον ἐν σαρκί" οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ 


ὮΣΞΞ 


3 λή 1 ‘ > , ΓΕ > - - 5 > ας “- " 
ἐντολή, καθὼς ἠκούσατε ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς, ἵνα ἐν αὐτῇ περιπατῆτε᾽ 7. 
ὅτι πολλοὶ | πλάνοι ™ εἰσῆλθον 2 εἰς τὸν κόσμον, οἱ μὴ " ὁμολογοῦντες 


c 


ἱ πλάνος Kal ὁ 


8. βλέπετε ἑαυτούς, ἵνα μὴ ἀπολέσωμεν ἃ εἰργασά- 


9. πᾶς 6* παραβαίνων," 


41, 42, χχ. καὶ μὴ "μένων ἐν τῇ διδαχῇ τοῦ Χριστοῦ, Θεὸν οὐκ ἔχει ᾿ ὁ μένων 


8; James ke hs 2 a Aus 
v.4. ἐν TH διδαχῇ τοῦ Χριστοῦ, 
r Matt. ii. 9, ba 


xiv. 22; Markx. 32; 1 Tim. v. 24 (προάγων). 
22, 23- 


a X S228 , A a εκ ” 
OUTOS και τον πάτερα KGL TOV ULOY εχει. 


si Tim. ii. 15; 2 Tim. iii. 14. {1 John ii. 


1 ἐστιν ἡ evToAn Ὁ ΠΡ; ἡ ἐντολὴ ἐστιν Ὁ ΒΚ, edd. 
3εισηλθον KLP; εξηλθον NAB, Syrbo, Vg., Sah., Arm., Iren. (III. xvii. 8), edd. 


(-av A, Tisch., WH). 


Samokeowpev απολαβωμεν KLP ; απολεσητε απολαβητε δ" (απολησθε) AB, 
Syrvg ph, Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., Iren., edd. ; εὐργασαμεθα BKLP, Syrph 
(marg.), Sah.; ypy-B*, WH, Nest.; epyaoaoBe SQA, Syrbo ph, Vg., Cop., Aeth., 


Arm., Iren., Tisch. 


4 παραβαινων KLP, Syrbo ph, Vg. (qui recedit), Cop., Arm. ; 


Aeth., edd. 


προαγων NAB, Sah., 


5 rov,xpiotov KLP, Cop., Aeth.; om. ΑΒ, Syrph, Vg., Sah., Arm., edd. 


perinde est acsi totum Pentateuchum 
servasset ”. 

Vv. 7-8. A Warning against Heretical 
Teaching. ‘‘ Because many deceivers 
went forth into the world—even they 
that confess not Jesus as Christ coming 
in flesh. This is the deceiver and the 
Antichrist. Look to yourselves, that ye 
may not lose what we wrought, but re- 
ceive a full wage.” 

Ver. 7. ὅτι explaining ἐρωτῶ σε: “1 
ask you to obey the old commandment 
because seducers are at work”. ἐξῆλθον 
εἰς τὸν κόσμον, See note on I John iv. 1. 
of μὴ ὁμολογοῦντες, a definite and well- 
known sect. See note on 1 Johnii. 4. 
ἐληλυθότα (1 John iv. 2) of the Advent, 
ἐρχόμενον of the continous manifestation 
of the incarnate Christ. Cf. Johni. 14, 
where σὰρξ ἐγένετο corresponds to éAn- 
λυθότα and ἐσκήνωσεν ἐν ἡμῖν to Epydp- 
ενον. 

Ver. 8. μισθόν, cf. Matt. xx.8; James 
v. 4. St.John here addresses not only 
Kyria but her family and ‘‘ the Church in 
her house”. He views them as his 
fellow-labourers in the Lord’s vineyard: 
‘We have worked together (ἠργασάμ.- 
εθα) : see that you do not forfeit the 
reward of your labour. Get a full wage. 
Be not like workmen who toward the 
close of the day fall off, doing their work 
badly or losing time, and get less than 
a full day’s pay.” ἀπολέσητε... . 
ἠργασάμεθα.... ἀπολάβητε: ‘ We have 
been fellow-workers thus far, and I mean 
to be faithful to the last; see that you 
also be so”. Their danger lay in taking 
up with false teaching and losing the 


comfort of the Gospel in its simplicity 
and fulness. 

Ver. g. Progress in Theological 
Thought. ‘ Every one that ‘ progress- 
eth’ and abideth not in the :eaching of 
the Christ hath not God; he that abideth 
in the teaching—this man hath both the 
Father and the Son.” 

ὁ προάγων : the Cerinthians (sec 
Introd. pp. 156 f.) boasted of their en- 
lightenment. They were “ progressives,” 
“advanced thinkers”. τῇ διδαχῇ τοῦ 
Χριστοῦ, the teaching which recognises 
Jesus as the Christ (see note on 1 John iv. 
1-2), z.e. the Messiah, the Saviour. Θεὸν 
οὐκ ἔχει; t.e. according to His true nature 
as the Father manitested in the Son (kai 
τὸν Πατέρα καὶ τὸν Υἱόν). It is neccs- 
sary not merely to beleve in God but 
to believe in Him ‘through Christ” 
(x Peter 15922): 

St. John does not here condemn theo- 
logical progress, which is a necessity of 
living and growing faith. A doctrine is 
a statement of Christian experience, and 
since there is always more in Christ than 
we have ever experienced, our doctrines 
can never be adequate or final. Theology 
is to God’s revelation in Grace as Science 
is to His revelation in Nature; and just 
as Science is always discovering more of 
the wonders of the First Creation, so 
Theology is always entering more deeply 
into the glory of the New Creation and 
appropriating more of the treasures which 
are hidden in Christ. Even the inspired 
Apostles did not comprehend all His ful- 
ness. Each saw only so much as was 
revealed to him, and declared only so 


Il. 


10. " εἴ τις ἔρχεται πρὸς ὑμᾶς, καὶ ταύτην τὴν διδαχὴν οὐ φέρει, " 
. , Peal > su x , SA ‘ , τ 
μὴ λαμβάνετε αὐτὸν εἰς οἰκίαν, καὶ χαίρειν αὐτῷ μὴ λέγετε 


IQANOY Β 


203 


2 Thess. 
ili. 6. 
Ir. 6V1Johni. 
3,6, 7; 


᾿ A , A a» 9 δι a a " 
ap λέγων 1 αὐτῷ χαίρειν, ’ κοινωνεῖ * τοῖς ἔργοις αὐτοῦ τοῖς πονηροῖς. 1 Tim. v. 
γὰρ Acy » χαιρειν, S Epyous ΟΡ | hic a 


w 1 John iii. 12. 


lo yap λεγων KLP, Iren. (I. ix. 3); 0 λεγων yap ΝΥ ΑΒ, edd. 


much as he saw. Each approached the 
infinite wonder along the lines of his 
temperament and experience. St. John 
saw in it arevelation of Eternal Life; St. 
Paul the Reconciliation of sinners to God, 
the satisfaction of humanity’s long desire 
and the completion of its long discipline 
under the Law; the author of t e Epistle 
to the Hebrews the rending of the Veil 
and the opening of free Access to God. 
St. John does not condemn theological 
progress; he defines its limits: ‘‘ abide 
in the teaching of the Christ”. (1) We 
must never break with the past ; the new 
truth is always an outgrowth of the old. 
A theology which is simply old is dead; 
a theology which is simply new is false 
(cf. Matt. xiii. 52). (2) We must main- 
tain ‘‘ the teaching of the Christ”. Jesus 
is the Saviour, and no interpretation of 
Christianity is true which eliminates 
Redemption or obscures the glory of the 
Cross. 

Vv. Io-11. Treatment of Heretical 
Teachers. ‘If any one cometh unto you 
and bringeth not this teaching, receive 
him not into your house, and bid him not 
farewell. For he that biddeth him fare- 
well hath fellowship with his works, his 
evil works.” 

Ver. τὸ. φέρει, not ‘‘endureth” (cf. 
Rom. ix. 22; Heb. xii. 20), but ‘‘ bring- 
eth” as a precious boon (cf. Rev. xxi. 24, 
26). εἰς οἰκίαν (cf. Mark ii. 1; iii. 10), 
zu Hause; cf. ‘to church,” ‘to town,” 
‘*to market,” “το bed”. See Moulton’s 
Winer, pp. 148 ff. χαῖρε, like ave, salve, 
was used of both the salutation at meet- 
ing and the farewell at yarting. The 
former is its prevailing use in N.T., but 
here, as in 2 Cor. xiii. τι, the latter. 
**Zum Abschied, wenn der Abgewiesene 
weiter zichen muss” (Holtzmann). 

Ver. τσ. κοινωνεῖ, cf. τ Johni. 3. An 
unholy κοινωνία. τοῖς ἔργ. αὐτ. τοῖς 
πον., cf. τ John i. 2: τὴν ζωὴν τὴν 
αἰώνιον. The adjective is an emphatic 
afterthought. 

This counsel recalls the story of St. 
John’s behaviour to Cerinthus (see Introd. 
p. 157), and it was cited by Irenzus (I. 
ix. 3) as inculcating intolerance of here- 
tics. If so, it is certainly an unChristian 
counsel, contrary to the spirit and teach- 
ing of our Lord (cf. Mark ix. 38-39; 


Luke ix. 51-56; Matt. xiii. 28-29). 
Heretics are our fell. w-creatures; Jesus 
died for them also, and our office is to 
win them. If we close our doors and 
our hearts against them, we lose our 
opportunity of winning them and harden 
them in their opposition. There are two 
thoughts which may weli teach us for- 
bearance and humility: (1) The patience 
of the Lord. A Jewish fable tells how 
Abraham thrust an aged wayfarer ‘rom 
his tent because he asked no blessing on 
his food and avow-d himself a fire-wor- 
shipper. And the Lord said: “1 have 
suffered him these hundred years, al- 
though he dishonoured Me; and couldst 
not thou endure him for one night?” 
(2) The mystery of the things of God 
and the blindness of our intellects. 
“« TIli,” says St. Augustine (Contra Epis- 
tolam Manichati, 2), ‘‘in vos seviant, qui 
nesciunt cum quo labore verum invenia- 
tur, et quam difficile caveantur errores”’. 
This counsel of the Apostle must be 
read in the light of local circumstances. 
There was need of caution and discrimin- 
ation in receiving the itinerant ‘‘ aposties 
and prophets” who went from church 
to church, lest they should prove “ false 
apostles ” (ψευδαπόστολοι) and “ false 
prophets ” (ψευδοπροφῆται). See Di- 
dache, xi.-xii., where the test is given : 
οὐ πᾶς 6 λαλῶν ἐν πνεύματι. προφήτης 
ἐστίν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐὰν ἔχῃ τοὺς τρόπους Κυρίου. 
It is not until the second century that 
there is any appearance of buildings set 
apart for worship. The primitive éxxAy- 
cia. met in private houses (cf Rom. 
XVIs wx (COL wxvisiexg)s)| \Col.iiv. τὸ 5 
Philem. 2); and when St. John warns 
Kyria against “ receiving into her house”’ 
a heretical teacher, it is not showing him 
hospitality that he forbids, but affor ing 
him an opportunity to unsettle the faith 
οἵ the brethren. She must neither let 
him pervert ‘‘ the church in her house” 
nor send him on his way to a neighbour- 
ing church ith the recommendation of 
her confidence and goodwill. ‘This is 
expressed, though somewhat vaguely, by 
Clem. Alex.: ‘‘ Hoc in hujusmodi non 
est inhumanum, sed nec conquirere vel 
condisputare cum talibus admonet qui 
non valent intelligibiliter divina tractare, 
ne per eos traducantur a doctrina veri- 


104 


{3 John 14. 

x1 Johni. 
4 reff, 

z Ver. I. 


IQANOY B 


12—I3. 


12. Πολλὰ ἔχων ὑμῖν γράφειν, οὐκ ἠβουλήθην ᾿ διὰ χάρτου Kat 
μέλανος “ ἀλλὰ ἐλπίζω ἐλθεῖν 2 πρὸς ὑμᾶς, καὶ “στόμα πρὸς στόμα 
λαλῆσαι, ἵνα ἣ χαρὰ ἡμῶν ὃ ἢ " πεπληρωμένη." 


13. ἀσπίζεταί σε 


τὰ τέκνα τῆς ἀδελφῆς σου τῆς " ἐκλεκτῆς. ἀμήν. 


1 εβουληθην ΦΑΒΚΙ;Ρ, edd. 


2 yeverOar ΑΒ, Syrph, Vg., edd. 


3 ypov SSKLP, Tisch., WH (marg.), Nest.; υμων AB, Vg., WH. 
4m wemAnpopevyn AKLP; πεπληρωμενὴ ἡ WB, edd. 
Saunv om. ABP, Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., edd. 


tatis, verisimilibus inducti rationibus. 
Arbitror autem, quia et orare cum talibus 
non oportet, quoniam in oratione que fit 
in domo, postquam ab orando surgitur, 
salutatio gaudii est et pacis indicium.” 

Vv. 12-13. The Conclusion. ‘‘ Though 
I have many things to write to you, I 
would not by paper and ink; but I hope 
to get to you, and talk face to face, that 
our joy may be tulfilled. The children of 
thine elect sister salute thee.” 

Ver. 12. Explanation of the brevity of 
the letter. ὑμῖν, z.e., Kyria, her children, 
and the church in her house. γράφειν 
connected ἀπὸ κοινοῦ with ἔχων and 
ἐβουλήθην. χάρτης, a sheet of papyrus, 
like those exhumed at Oxyrhynchus (see 
Deissmann, New Light on the New Test., 
pp. 12 ff.), the common material for 
Jetter-writing. μέλαν, atramentum ; in 
N. T. only here, 3 John 13, 2 Cor. iii. 3. 
γενέσθαι πρὸς ὑμᾶς (cf. John x. 35; Acts 
x. 13; 1 Cor. ii. 3, xvi. 10): he was plan- 
ning a visitation (see Introd. p. 155). 
στόμα πρὸς στόμα, “mouth answering 
mouth”; cf. LXX. Num. xii. 8; Jer. 
XXXii. (xxxix.), 4. 

Why would he not write all that was 
in his mind? It was a deliberate deci- 
sion ere he took pen in hand: this is the 
force of οὐκ ἐβουλήθην. His heart was 
jull, and writing was a poor medium of 
communication (Beng.: “Ipsa scribendi 
opera non juvat semper cor affectu sacro 
plenum”); he was an old man, and writ- 
ing was fatiguing to him (Plummer). 


The reason is deeper. The ‘many 
things” which he had in his mind, were 
hard things like his warning against in- 
tercourse with heretics, and he would 
not write them at a distance but would 
wait till he was on the spot and had 
personal knowledge. It is easy to lay 
down general principles, but their ap- 
plication to particular cases is a delicate 
task, demanding knowledge, sympathy. 
charity. (1) The sight of people’s faces 
appeals to one’s heart and softens one’s 
speech. (2) When one meets with 
people and talks with them, one’s judg- 
ment of them and their opinions is 
often modified. Writing from Ephesus, 
St. John might have condemned a teacher 
in a neighbouring town whose teaching 
he knew only by report; but perhaps, τῇ 
he met the man and heard what he had 
to say, he might discover that there was 
nothing amiss, at all events nothing 
which called for excommunication. Dr. 
Dale of Birmingham was at first inclined 
to look with disfavour on Mr. Moody. 
He went to hear him, and his opinion 
was altered. He regarded him ever after 
with profound respect, and considered 
that he had a right to preach the Gospel, 
‘because he could never speak of a lost 
soul without tears in his eyes”. St. 
John shrank from hasty condemnation 
that there might be no after-regret— 
ἵνα ἡ χαρὰ ἡμῶν πεπληρωμένη ἥ. 
Ver. 13. See Introd. pp. 162 f. 


JQANNOY TOY AITOZTOAOY. 


ENMISTOAH KA@OAIKH TPITH.! 


τ, *“O ΠΡΕΣΒΥΤΕΡΟΣ Γαΐῳ τῷ ἀγαπητῷ, ὃν ἐγὼ ἀγαπῶ ” ἐν ἀληθείᾳ. 8 4 J pha 


2. ᾿Αγαπητέ, περὶ πάντων εὔχομαί σε “ εὐοδοῦσθαι καὶ ὑγιαίνειν, b2 John 
I ret. 


καθὼς “ εὐοδοῦταί σου ἡ ψυχή. 


3. “ ἐχάρην yap? λίαν, ἐρχομένων ¢ τ Cor. xvi. 


ἀδελφῶν καὶ μαρτυρούντων σου τῇ ἀληθείᾳ, καθὼς σὺ “ ἐν ἀληθείᾳ 4 2 John 4. 


περιπατεῖς. 


, © 
4. ‘perLorépay τούτων οὐκ ἔχω χαράν," iva ἀκούω τὰ ἔτ: 


e 2 John 4. 
ohni. 4. 


1iwavvov Y SN; twavov Y B; wavvov ἐπιστολη Y C, many minusc. ; twavvov 
ἐπιστολὴ καθολικὴ Ὑ ΤΟΙ, 106; ἐπιστολὴ TpLTH Tov αγιου αποστολου twavvov L ; 
του αὐτου αγιου Lwavvov του θεολογου ἐπιστολὴ τριτὴ 95; ἐπιστολὴ του αγιου 
«ποστολου και ηγαπήμενου προς γαΐον ιωαννοῦυ 4. 


Ξγαρ ABCKLP, Syrbo ph, Cop., WH, Nest.; om. §§, Vg., Sah., Aeth., Arm., 


Tisch. 


3 yapav SACKLP, Tisch., WH (marg.), Nest.; xapw B, Vg., Cop., WH. 


Tue TuHirD EPISTLE. 

Vv. 1-4. Address and Commendation. 
“ The Elder to Gaius the beloved, whom 
Ilovein Truth. Beloved, in all respects 
I pray that thou mayest prosper and be 
in health, even as thy soul prospereth. 
For I was exceedingly glad when breth- 
ren would come and testify to thy Truth, 
even as thou walkest in Truth, A 
greater gladness than this I have not— 
that I should hear of my children walking 
in the Truth.” 


Ver. 1. 6 πρεσβύτερος, see Introd. 
pp. 159 ff. éy#,seenoteon2Johni. ἐν 


ἀληθείᾳ, see note on 2 Johni. 

Ver. 2. Cf. Law, Ser. Call, chap. vii. : 
“Flavia would be a miracle of piety, if 
she was but half as careful of her soul as 
she is of her body. The rising of a 
pimple on her face, the sting of a gnat, 
will make her keep her room for two or 
three days, and she thinks they are very 
rash people that do not take care of 
things in time.” Penn, Fruits of Soli- 
tude: ‘* Heis curious to wash, dress and 
perfume his Body, but careless of his 
Soul. The one shall have many Hours, 
the other not so many Minutes.” περὶ 
πάντων, de omnibus, with εὐοδοῦσθαι καὶ 
ὑγιαίνειν, not pre omnibus, “above all 


things”. The latter use is epic (e.g., 
Hom. Il. 1. 287: περὶ πάντων eppevar 
ἄλλων), and prosperity and health were 
not the summa bona in the Apostle’s 


estimation. εὐοδοῦσθαι, “prosper” in 
worldly matters. Trouble tests char- 
acter. 


“A good knight is best known 
in battle, a a Christian in the time of 
trouble and adversity”; and Gaius had 
stood the test. The hostility of Dio- 
trephes, probably a well-to-do member of 
the Church, had lessened his maintenance 
(εὐοδοῦσθαι) and affected his health 
(ὑγιαίνειν), yet St. John has only ad- 
miration for the spirit he has manifested 
and commendation for the part he has 
played. 

Ver. 3. ἐχάρην, see note on 2 John 4. 
ἐρχομένων, repeatedly, not on one par- 
ticular occasion (ἐλθόντων). The itiner- 
ant brethren (die reisenden Briider) were 
always at work, going out from Ephesus 
on their missions and returning with 
their reports. Cf. vv. 5-6. See Introd. 
Ρ. 155. ι 

Ver. 4. Cf. Senec. Ep. xxxiv.: ‘Si 
agricolam arbor ad fructum perducta de- 
lectat, si pastor ex foetu gregis sui capit 
voluptatem, si alumnum suum nemo 
aliter intuetur quam adulescentiam illius 


206 


gi Tim.i. 
2; x Cor, 
iv. 15; 
Philem. 
10; Gal. 
iv. 19. 

h Matt. 

_ XXvi. 10. 

i Heb. xiii.1. Κι John iii. 22 reff. 
1 Cor. xvi. 6, 11; 2 Cor. i. 16. 


ley NC°KLP ; ev tn ABC%, edd. 


IQANOY Γ 


ὅ ἐμὰ τέκνα ev! ἀληθείᾳ περιπατοῦντα. 


™ προπέμψας " ἀξίως τοῦ Θεοῦ. 


12 ἜΘ ΕΣ ὙΌΣ 
ni Thess. ii. 12; Col. i. 10. 


5— 


3 , ‘ κ 
5. ᾿Αγαπητέ, πιστὸν ποιεῖς 


ὃ ἐὰν ἢ ἐργάσῃ 2 εἰς τοὺς ἀδελφοὺς καὶ εἰς τοὺς ® * ξένους, 6. ot ἐμαρ- 
τύρησάν σου τῇ ἀγάπῃ " ἐνώπιον ἐκκλησίας ᾿ ols | καλῶς ποιήσεις 


7. ὑπὲρ yap ° τοῦ ὀνόματος ἐξῆλθον ἢ 


m Acts xv. 3, xx. 38, xxi. 5; Rom. xv. 24; 
o Acts v. 40, 41; 1 Peter iv. 14, 16.. 


‘ 


2 epyaon SBCKLP, edd. ; εργαζη A, Vg. (quidquid operaris). 
3 eus τους KLP; rovro SABC, Vg., Syrbo ph, Vg., Cop., Sah., Aeth., Arm., edd. 


4 e&nAOav YB, edd. 


Suam judicet : quid evenire credis his qui 
ingenia educaverunt, et que tenera for- 
maverunt adulta subito vident?” Ev. 
sec. Heb, (quoted by Jerome on Eph. v. 
4): “Et numquam, inquit (Dominus), 
126 11 sitis nisicum fratrem vestrum vide- 
ritis in caritate”. μειζοτέραν, a double 
compar.; cf, ἐλαχιστοτέρῳ (Eph. ili. 8) ; 
our “lesser”; Germ. mehrere. τούτων: 
this use of the plur. (ταῦτα) rather than 
the sing. (τοῦτο) iscommon. See Moul- 
ton’s Winer, p. 201. ἵνα, epexegetic of 
τούτων. Cf. Luke i. 43 and see note on 1 
John iii. 11. τέκνα implies that Gaius 
was aconvert ofSt. John. Cf. marg. note. 

Vv. 5-8. The Duty of Entertaining 
Itinerant Preachers. ‘“ Beloved, it is a 
work of faith that thou art doing in thy 
treatment of the brethren, strangers 
withal. They testified to thy love before 
the Church; and thou wilt do well in 
speeding them on their way worthily of 
God. For it was for the sake of the 
Name that they went forth, taking no- 
thing from the Gentiles. We therefore 
are bound to undertake for such, that 
we may prove fellow-workers with the 
Truth.” 

A company of reisende Briider had 
returned to Ephesus, and in reporting 
of their mission at a meeting of the 
Church had made special mention of 
the hospitality of Gaius. The Apostle 
commends him and bids him continue his 
good offices. 

Ver. 5. The adjective πιστός is either 
act., ‘‘ believing” (cf. John xx. 27), or 
passive, ‘‘ worthy to be believed,” “ trust- 
worthy ” (cf. 2 Tim. ii. 2). It is passive 
here, and it is well explained by Cécu- 
menius as equivalent to ἄξιον πιστοῦ 
ἀνδρός. The peculiarity is that, by a sort 
of hypallage, the adjective is transferred 
irom the subjective to the objective. 
Transitive: ‘‘ Thou makest whatever thou 
workest on the brethren a believing act, 
a work of faith”. It was not mere hos- 
pitality but a religious service. West- 
cott’s rendering: ‘thou makest sure 


whatsoever thou doest ” gives πιστόν an 
unexampled and indeed impossible mean- 
ing. ποιεῖς, aor. of habitual and con- 
stant hospitality; épyaoy, aor. of each 
particular act. καὶ τοῦτο, “and that 
to”; more commonly καὶ ταῦτα (cf. 
Heb. xi. 12). 

ver. 6. On theanarthrous ἐκκλησίας, 
see note on 2 John το. καλῶς ποιήσεις 
has the sense of ‘‘ please” in the Oxy- 
thynchus Papyri; ¢.g., 300, 3-6: ἔπεμψά 
σοι διὰ τοῦ καμηλείτου Ταυρείνου To 
πανάριον, περὶ οὗ καλῶς ποιήσεις ἐν- 
τιφωνήσασά μοι ὅτι ἐκομίσου, “1 sent 
you the bread-basket by the cameleer 
Taurinus ; please let me have word again 
that you got it”. προπέμψας: when a 
Rabbi visited a town, it was customary 
on his departure to escort him on his 
way (Lightfoot, Hor. Heb., on Matt. v. 
41). The gracious usage was observed 
in the primitive Church, and it appears 
to have included the furnishing of p:o- 
vision for the journey (cf. Tit. ii 13). 
Cf. Hom. Od. xv.,74: χρὴ ξεῖνον παρεόντα. 
φιλεῖν, ἐθέλοντα δὲ πέμπειν. “ welcome 
the coming, speed the parting guest ”. 
ἀξίως τοῦ Θεοῦ, “in a manner wortiy of 
God,” ἐξ. (1) “Since they are God’s 
representatives (John xiii. 20), weil thr 
' vangelistenwerk Gottes Werk ist 
(Holtzm.), treat them as you would treat 
God”; (2) ‘Since you are God’s re- 
presentatives, treat them as God would 
treat them”. 

Ver. 7. τοῦ Ὀνόματος, sc. of Jesus. 
(cf. Acts v. 40, 41). There is perhaps a 
reference to this verse in Ignat. ad Eph. 
vii. I: εἰώθασι yap τινες δόλῳ πονηρῷ TO 
ὄνομα περιφέρειν, ἄλλα τινὰ πράσσοντες 
ἀνάξια Θεοῦ. Cf. iii. τ: δέδεμαι ἐν τῷ’ 
ὀνόματι. ἐξῆλθαν, sc. from Ephesus, the 
seat of the Apostle and therefore the 
headquarters of the Church in Asia 
Minor. Cf. Introd. p. 155. μηδέν, see 
note on I Johnii. 4. Winer (Moulton’s 
Winer, p. 463, note 1) draws a distinction, 
perhaps too fine, between λαμβάνειν 
παρά Tivos and λαμβάνειν ἀπό Tivos. 


Il. 


ἐπιδέχεται ἡμᾶς. 


IQANOY Γ 207 
μηδὲν λαμβάνοντες 4 ἀπὸ τῶν ἐθνῶν. 8. ἡμεῖς οὖν " ὀφείλομεν ἀπο- P ae yal 
2 N , ῳ 8 ἘΜῈ , a i ix. 12-15. 
λιμβώνεῳ τοὺς τριοντοὺς, ἵνα " συνεργοὶ " γινώμεθα τῇ ἀληθείᾳ. ο. cee 
” ~ 2 <a 2) eth , = ἃ ‘ > 15. 
Εγραψα ὃ τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ - ἀλλ᾽ ὁ φυλοπρωτεύων αὐτῶν Αἰοτρεφὴς οὐκ ἐδ μη ἢ. 
10. διὰ τοῦτο, ἐὰν ἔλθω, " ὑπομνήσω αὐτοῦ τὰ Oref. - 
ν Νὴ εἰ jf err LS LA ΟΣ Ree 2 s Rom. xvi. 
ἔργα ἃ ποιεῖ, λόγοις πονηροῖς ” φλυαρῶν ἡμᾶς ᾿ καὶ μὴ ἀρκούμενος 3) 9 21: 
‘ I - ill. 
ἐπὶ τούτοις, οὔτε αὐτὸς ἐπιδέχεται τοὺς ἀδελφούς, καὶ τοὺς βουλο- 9; 2 Cor. 
\ βῆ δοῦ Vili. 23. 
μένους “ κωλύει, καὶ ἐκ τῆς ἐκκλησίας " ἐκβάλλει. τι. ᾿Αγαπητέ, ” μὴ t Matt. v. 
45. 
v John xiv. 26; 2 Tim. ii. 14; Tit. iii. 1. w 1 Tim. v. 13. x Mark ix. 


u Cf. Matt. xx. 27. 


38, 30. y John rx. 34. 


z Rom. xii. 9; Ps. xxxvii. 27. 


1 εθνων KLP; εθνικων SABC, edd. 
2 απολαμβανειν KLP; υπολαμβανειν SSABC*, edd. 
3 eypawa: add τι SABC, Cop., Sah., Arm., edd. 


The former would have been used here 
had the Gentiles “ proferred an acknow- 
ledgment; the latter implies exaction. 
The missionaries might have accepted 
maintenance (Matt. x. ro), but like St. 
Paul they waived their right, ‘that they 
might cause no hindrance to the Gospel 
of Christ ” (1 Cor. ix.). 

Ver. 8. ἡμεῖς, emphatic in contrast to 
the Gentiles. ὀφείλομεν, of moral obli- 
gation. See note on 1 Johnii. 6. twodap- 
βάνειν, suscipere, ‘receive hospitably ” 
(cf. ὑποδέχεσθαι), “take under one’s 
protection”. Observe the Wortspiel— 
λαμβάνοντες, ὑπολαμβάνειν. συνεργοὶ 
τῇ ἀληθείᾳ : a division of labour. [Ιἴννε 
cannot preach the Gospel ourselves, we 
may help others to doit. William Carey, 
comparing his missionary enterprise to 
the exploration of a mine, said: ‘I will 
go down if you will hold the ropes”. 

Vv. 9-το. Churlishness of Diotrephes. 
“1 wrote something to the Church, but 
Diotrephes, who loveth pre-eminence 
over them, doth not receive us. There- 
fore, if I come, I shall call to remem- 
brance his works which he doeth, prating 
about us with evil words; and, not con- 
tent therewith, neither doth he himself 
receive the brethren and them that would 
he preventeth and casteth out of the 
Church.” 

“ Der Zweck des 3. Briefes liegt in der 
Empfehlung der Gastfreundschaft gegen 
wandernde Glaubensboten ” (Holtzm.). 

Ver. 9. ἔγραψα τι, a brief letter of 
commendation, συστατικὴ ἐπιστολή (2 
Cor. iii. 1), introducing and authorising 
a company of itinerant brethren, probably 
those referred to in v. 5. φιλοπρω- 
τεύειν, ‘love to be first, to be chief ’ (ἅπαξ 
λεγόμενον). The noun is φιλοπρωτεία 
and the adj. φιλόπρωτος (Polyb., Plut ). 
προάγειν (2 John 9) and φιλοπρωτεύειν 
denote two tempers which disturbed the 
Christian life of Asia Minor—intellectual 


arrogance and personal aggrandisement. 
αὐτῶν refers κατὰ σύνεσιν to ἐκκλησίᾳ. 
οὐκ ἐπιδέχεται ἡμᾶς, “doth not receive 
me in the person of my delegates ”’ (cf. 
Matt. x. 40), z.e., “ disowneth my autho- 
rity”. 

Ver. το. ἐὰν ἔλθω: the aged Apostle 
with his failing strength can only ‘‘hope” 
(cf. ver. 14) to undertake the journey. 
ὑπομνήσω αὐτοῦ τὰ ἔργα; not “remind 
him of his works”’ (contrast the “work ”’ 
of Gaius in ver. 5), but ‘* bring his works 
to remembrance,” by reciting them at a 
meeting of the Church. St. John does 
not threaten excommunication or any 
sort of discipline, but simply that he will 
state the facts and let them speak for 
themselves. A terrible reckoning, like 
that of the Day of Judgment (cf. Rev. 
xx. 12)—to hear a recital of all one’s 
passionate speeches and _ inconsiderate 
actions. Contrast St. Paul’s threats 
(x Cor. iv. 21; 2 Cor. x. 11, ΧΙ. 1-3). 
St. John deserved to be called “the 
Apostle of Love”. φλυαρεῖν (nugari, 
verschwatsen), of foolish chattering. 
Suid.: φλύαρος - φλήναφος καὶ λῆρος 
καὶ μάταιος λόγος. The chatter of Dio- 
trephes was not only foolish but male- 
volent (λόγοις πονηροῖς). μὴ ἄρκ., see 
note on i Johnii. 4. οὔτε . - - καί, cf. 
John iv. τι. κωλύει, ἐκβάλλει, Ιρτα5. 
implying not that he actually did it but 
that he tried to do it. ἐκβάλλει, here 
not of literal ejection (cf. John 11. !15= 
Matt. xxi. 12= Mark xi. 15) but of ex- 
communication from the fellowship of 
the congregation. 

Vv. 11,12. Testimony to Demetrius. 
‘6 Beloved, do not imitate what is bad but 
what is good. He that doeth what is 
good is of God; he that doeth what is 
bad hath not seen God. To Demetrius 
testimony hath been borne by all and by 
the Truth itself; yea, and we testify. and 
thou knowest that our testimony is true.” 


208 


a Heb. xiii. a 


LQANOY Γ 


μιμοῦ τὸ κακόν, ἀλλὰ TO ἀγαθόν. 


_ 


I2—I5. 


6 ἀγαθοποιῶν, ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐστιν " 


12. Δημητρίῳ “μεμαρ- 
“kal ἡμεῖς δὲ 


5 Ye , x , 
και στόμα προς στομα 


7. 
Pr John 6 δὲ! κακοποιῶν, οὐχ ἑώρακε τὸν Θεόν. 
αν} τὸ 2, τύρηται ὑπὸ πάντων, καὶ ὑπ᾽ αὐτῆς τῆς ἀληθείας ᾿ 
d John xix. ἢ ὶ οἴδατεξ ὅτι ἡ ία ἡμῶν ἀληθής ἐ 
John IX. μαρτυροῦμεν, καὶ οἴδατε" ὅτι ἡ μαρτυρία ἡμῶν ἀληθής ἐστι. 
: pee Dy 3 Πολλὰ εἶχον ypdew,? ἀλλ᾽ οὐ θέλω διὰ μέλανος καὶ καλάμου 
Bee se σοι γράψαι "4 14. ἐλπίζω δὲ εὐθέως ἰδεῖν σε, 
13; Lu 
xxiv. 36; λαλήσομεν. 
John xx. 


19,21, 36; TOUS ὃ φίλους ἢ κατ᾽ ὄνομα. 
1 Peter v. ‘i ἦν 
14. g John xi. 11; Acts xxvii. 3. 


15. ‘Eipyyn σοι. ἀσπάζονταί σε οἱ " φίλοι. ἀσπάζου 


h John x. 3. 


10 Se L, Cop., Aeth., Arm. ; o SABCKP, Syrph, Vg., Sah., edd. 

2 ou8are KLP, Syrbo ph, Aeth. ; οιἱδας ΦΑΒΟ, Vg., Cop., Sah., Arm. 
3 γραφειν KLP; γραψαι σοι SABC, edd. 

4 ypayar KLP; ypadew SABC, edd. 

5 Serv oe SEKLP; ce ver ABC, edd. 


Ver. 11. A warming against evil ex- 
ample. The pres. participles ἀγαθοποιῶν. 
κακοποιῶν denote continuance in and 
practice of good or bad. See note on 
I John iii. 6. ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ, “a child of 
God” (cf. τ John iii. 10). Observe the 
gentleness of the Apostle: the natural 
antithesis of ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ would be ἐκ 
τοῦ ϑιαβόλου (1 John iii. 8), but he says 
οὐχ ἑώρακεν τὸν Θεόν. 

Ver. 12. Application of the warning 
against evil example: Do not imitate 
Diotrephes, but imitate Demetrius. De- 
metrius was probably the bearer (Ueber- 
bringer) of the epistle. There is no 
teason for identifying him with Deme- 
trius the silversmith of Ephesus (Acts 
xix. 24). B. Weiss (Einleit.), supporting 
the ecclesiastical interpretation of 2 John 
(see Introd. p. 162) and finding a refer- 
ence to it in 3 John 9, regards Deme- 
trius as the recipient (Empfdnger) of the 
former—a member of the Church and a 
striking contrast to his fellow-member 
Diotrephes. But evidently he was a 
stranger to Gaius and needed introduc- 
tion and commendation. St. John gives 
him a threefold testimony: (1) that of 
the whole community at Ephesus (ὑπὸ 
πάντων) : (2) that of ‘‘the Truth” (see 
note on τ Johni. 8): he fulfilled the re- 
quirements of the Gospel and exemplified 
its saving power; (3) that of the Apostle 
and his colleagues at Ephesus (ἡμεῖς) : 
he has long been honoured by his com- 
munity as an embodiment of the Truth 
(μεμαρτύρηται), and the Apostle testifies 
this when he is going among strangers 
ignorant of his past (μαρτυροῦμεν). καὶ 
. . . δὲ, see note on τ Johni. 3. οἶδας 
ὅτι, κιτιλ. : because St. John knew him 


so well. Demetrius belonged to the 
Church of Ephesus and was probably a 
convert of the Apostle. 

Vv. 13-15. The Conclusion. “I had 
many things to write to thee, but I am 
not minded to be writing to thee by pen 
and ink. However, I hope presently to 
see thee, and we shall talk face to face. 
Peace to thee! The friends salute thee. 
Salute the friends by name.” 

Cf. 2 John, 12-13. The similarity of 
the conclusions suggests that the two 
epistles were written at the same time. 
The Apostle meditated a visitational 
circuit (see Introd. p. 155) in the course of 
which he would see both Kyria and 
Gaius. 

Ver. 13. γράψαι, aor. of the complete 
composition in the Apostle’s mind; γρά- 
φειν, pres. of the process of putting it on 
paper. κάλαμος (in full κάλαμος ypa- 
devs), a reed-pen, as distinguished from 
γραφεῖον, a sharp-pointed sti/us for writ- 
ing on waxed tablets. Plutarch (Dem., 
29, 3) Says that Demosthenes, when 
meditating and writing, was accustomed 
to bite his κάλαμος. 

Ver. 15. εἰρήνη σοι, pax tibi, the 


Jewish ‘greeting, ὮΝ Ὁ w (Jud. vi. 


23, xix. 20), ot φίλοι, those at Ephesus; 
τοὺς φίλους, those with Gaius. St. John 
knew all “by name,” and would have 
named them had space permitted. He 
had the true shepherd’s heart (cf. John 
x. 3, the only other place where κατ᾽ 
ὄνομα occurs in N.T.). Ignat., ad 
Smyrn., xiii. 2: ἀσπάζομαι “AAkny, τὸ 
παθητόν μοι ὄνομα, καὶ Δάφνον, τὸν 
ἀσύγκριτον καὶ εὔτεκνον, καὶ πάντας 
κατ᾽ ὄνομα. 


THE GENERAL EPISTLE 
OF 


JUDE. 





INTRODUCTION, 
CHAPTER I. 
Relation of the Second Epistle of Peter to the Epistle of Fude.' 


THE general resemblance between the two Epistles will be apparent 
from the marginal references to my text. I propose here to com- 
pare them throughout, stating the reasons which have led me to 
believe that the epistle of Jude was known to the author of 2 Peter, 
not vice versa.” 

To begin with, both style themselves servants of Jesus Christ 
and address themselves to those who in some way belong to God 
and to Jesus Christ, desiring that peace might be multiplied upon 
them. We notice here certain differences occasioned by the differ- 
ence of the writers. J. marks his identity by naming his brother 
James; P. claims apostleship. J. adds the prayer for mercy and 
and love to that for peace ; P. who is about to speak more fully of 
love immediately, omits it here, and changes ἔλεος into the wider 
χάρις. J. defines his readers as ‘“‘the called who have been beloved 
by God the Father and kept safe in Jesus Christ ’’; P. defers the 
notion of ‘‘ calling” to the third and tenth verses, and dwells here on 
God's free gift of faith (τοῖς λαχοῦσιν πίστιν) as characteristic of his 
readers. He adds two remarkable phrases (1) that, through the 
justice of our God and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, this faith is 
(2) equally privileged with that of the writer (whether we are to 
regard him as representing the Apostles, or the Jews, as seems to 
me more probable), and he emphasises this equality of Jew and 
Gentile by the unique use of his own double name, the Hebrew 
“«Symeon” added to the Greek “ Peter,” suggesting that his sym- 
pathies embrace both. We may compare with this the friendly re- 
ference to St. Paul in iii. 15, and the association of Silvanus with 
the writer in 1 Peter. 


1 For the justification of the readings and interpretations adopted in the follow- 
ing chapters, see critical and explanatory notes. 
2In what follows P. stands for 2 Peter, J. for Jude. 


212 INTRODUCTION 


After this greeting J. turns at once to the immediate occasion 
for his letter. He had been preparing, he says, to write on the 
subject which is of highest interest to all Christians, viz., salvation,’ 
when news reached him of a new danger threatening the Church, 
against which he felt bound to warn his readers. It seems hardly 
possible to suppose that this note of alarm could have come to him 
through P., who writes in a much more leisurely way, not feeling it 
necessary at once to plunge into controversy and supply his readers 
with weapons for the defence of the faith. In fact the latter begins 
with the very subject which J. had felt himself obliged to omit, or at 
least to postpone to the end of his Epistle (ver. 20), viz. the doctrine 
of salvation. Thus we seem to lose sight of J. until the beginning 
of the second chapter of P., but we shall see that in the intervening 
passage of P. there is frequent recurrence to thoughts which are 
found in the former epistle. j 

After speaking generally of the blessings in store for man through 
the goodness of God, P. goes on (i. 5) to speak of the corresponding 
duty on man’s part. We are to use every effort to build up the 
Christian life in its seven-fold completeness on the rock of faith. 
Towards the end of J. we find words which may very possibly have 
suggested to P. this idea of the seven ascending tiers rising on the 
foundation of faith and culminating in love (J. ver. 20), ἐποικοδομοῦντες 
ἑαυτοὺς τῇ ἁγιωτάτῃ ὑμῶν πίστει . . . ἑαυτοὺς ἐν ἀγάπῃ Θεοῦ τη- 
ρήσατε. The phrase σπουδὴν πᾶσαν οὗ P. i. 5 occurs also in J. ver. 3. 
The mention of εὐσέβεια in P. i. 3, 6, 7 may be due to the prevalence 
of ἀσέβεια so often deplored by J. The verses which follow (i. 8-11) 
dwell on the importance of the cultivation of these virtues or graces. 
“ Their continued growth will tend to make us not unfruitful (cf. J. 
ver. 12) in regard to that knowledge of God, out of which they grow. 
Their absence causes blindness, or at least limits us to narrow 
earthly views, and makes us forgetful of the baptismal cleansing 
from the sins of our old life. Remember that it is not enough simply 
to have been baptised. We have to make sure the calling and 
election of which baptism was the seal. If you are diligent in doing 
this, you will never stumble, but will have a glorious entry into the 
eternal kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” Here toc 
we find connecting links with the later verses of J. ‘‘ Eternal life’ 
is the goal in J. ver. 21, ‘“‘the eternal kingdom,” in P.i. 11. The 
οὐ μὴ πταίσητε and the πλουσίως ἐπιχορηγηθήσεται of P. remind us of J.’s 
summing up in ver. 24, ‘“‘God our Saviour is able to keep us without 


1The word κοινήν here may have suggested to P. his phrase ἰσότιμον πίστιν. 


INTRODUCTION 213 


stumbling and to set us before His glory without blemish in ex- 
ceeding joy”. 

P, continues (i. 12-15), “1 know that you are established in this 
truth, but it will be always my care to remind you of it, as | am 
indeed bound to do, whilst I continue in this earthly habitation. 
Even after I leave it, as our Lord Jesus Christ has warned me that 
I must soon do, I hope to bequeath to you a legacy which will enable 
you to make mention of these things after my departure.” We 
have here an echo of J. ver. 5, “1 desire to put you in remembrance, 
though ye know all things,” 1.6., as it is explained afterwards, though 
you are familiar with the examples of judgment contained in the 
O.T., including the punishment of the angels who sinned. P. ad- 
dressing Gentiles, who could hardly be expected to be familiar with a 
narrative resting mainly on Jewish tradition, gives the phrase a 
more fitting application in reference to the general moral and 
religious teaching which precedes. 

The connexion between the two Epistles is most conspicuous in 
the second chapter of P. In both, this section begins with a short 
Introduction (J. ver. 4, P. ii. 1-3), describing in general terms the 
innovators against whom the readers are warned. They steal into 
the Church, they deny the only Master (δεσπότην), their lives are im- 
pure, the verdict of heaven has long been pronounced against them. 
To this P. prefixes a clause to connect the new subject with that of the 
preceding chapter. The gift of prophecy was liable to misuse under 
the old dispensation (of which he presently quotes Balaam as an 
example, cf. P. ii. 15, 16, and J. ver. 11). Corresponding to this in 
the new dispensation’ will be the abuse of teaching (cf. James iii. 1- 
12) ; and these false teachers will introduce destructive heresies and 
bring on themselves swift destruction. [The word ἀπώλεια does not 
occur in J., but in the next verse he says that the Lord τοὺς μὴ 
πιστεύσαντας ἀπώλεσεν.) ΡΟ. adds the Pauline epithet dyopdcavta be- 
fore δεσπότην. He foretells that many will follow the loose living of 
these teachers and that thus the way of truth (Ps. cxix. 30) will be 
evil spoken of (Isa. lii. 5). He speaks of their covetousness (cf. J. 
ver. 11 on Balaam) and of their glozing words. While J. denounces ot 
πάλαι mpoyeypappevor εἰς τοῦτο τὸ κρίμα (where the reference in τοῦτο is 
obscure), P. has the fine phrase οἷς τὸ κρίμα οὐκ ἀργεῖ καὶ ἡ ἀπώλεια 
αὐτῶν οὐ νυστάζει. On the other hand we lose J.’s τὴν τοῦ Θεοῦ χάριτα 
μετατιθέντες εἰς ἀσέλγειαν, for which perhaps ἐλευθερίαν αὐτοῖς émayyeh- 
λόμενοι, αὐτοὶ δοῦλοι ὑπάρχοντες τῆς φθορᾶς (P. ii. 19) was intended as 
an equivalent, cf. Gal. v. 18, ἐπ᾽ ἐλευθερίᾳ ἐκλήθητε: μόνον μὴ τὴν’ 
ἐλευθερίαν εἰς ἀφορμὴν τῇ σαρκί. 

VOL. V. 14 


214 INTRODUCTION 


Then follow (J. vv. 5-7) three examples of judgment taken from 
the O.T.: Israel in the Wilderness, the offending angels, the sin of 
Sodom, which are repeated in P. ii. 4-9, except that the Deluge 
takes the place of the punishment of Israel. Why was this change 
made? Probably because the destruction of the world by water 
and the destruction of Sodom by fire were recognised types of 
Divine vengeance (Lk. xvii. 26-29), and also because P. is about to 
speak of the Deluge below (iii. 5-7) to show that there is nothing 
incredible in the destruction of the existing universe by fire. More- 
over he had already referred to the case of Israel (ἐν τῷ λαῷ) in 
comparing the false prophets of the O.T. with the false teachers of 
the N.T. Perhaps, too, he wished to keep the chronological order 
in his three examples. It has been suggested in the note on τὸ 
δεύτερον that, in speaking of the destruction of Israel after their 
falling back into unbelief, J. may have had in his mind the question 
of the forgiveness of post-baptismal sin. There is perhaps a similar 
reference in P. i. 9, λήθην λαβὼν τοῦ καθαρισμοῦ τῶν πάλαι αὐτοῦ ἅμαρ- 
τιῶν as well as in P. ii. 20. With regard to P.’s triplet, it is to be 
noticed that it is given in a far more animated form than that of J., 
being used as a protasis to an apodosis applying the same principles 
to the persons addressed, εἰ yap 6 Θεὸς οὐκ ἐφείσατο κιτιλ. Of the 
angels P. says merely that they sinned, J. dwells on their pristine 
dignity, and follows the book of Enoch in making their sin to consist 
partly in the fall from their high estate, and partly in their going 
after σαρκὸς ἑτέρας, as the men of Sodom did afterwards τὸν ὅμοιον 
τρόπον τούτοις, J. ver. 7. If P. had J. before him, these omissions are 
natural; if J. wrote after P., he would scarcely have gone out of his 
way to insert particulars so derogatory to the angelic nature. As to 
their punishment, they are reserved, in both epistles, for judgment 
under darkness in chains. 

It is interesting to compare what is said in the two Epistles about 
the two missionaries of the antediluvian world. In J. ver. 14 Enoch, 
the seventh from Adam, appears simply as the denouncer of ven- 
geance to come: in P. Noah is a preacher of righteousness and he 
is the eighth saved. In my edition of 2 Peter I have suggested that 
the writer may have intended a mystical opposition between the two 
numbers; and, I think, this is confirmed by the way in which the 
number 8 is introduced in 1 P. iii. 20 (κιβωτοῦ) εἰς ἣν ὀλίγοι, τοῦτ᾽ 
ἔστιν ὀκτὼ ψυχαί, διεσώθησαν δι᾿ ὕδατος. The ark is here regarded as a 
symbol of the Church. What was the writer’s motive in adding 
that it contained only a few, and further that these few, on being 
reckoned up, were found to amount to 8? Must he not have in- 


INTRODUCTION 215 


tended to signify that, while the visible Church consisted of a mere 
“remnant,” a “little flock,” yet these few represented all who share 
the Resurrection of Christ, “the general assembly and church of the 
first-born,” which would be continually recruited not only from the 
living, but also from the dead by the ever-present, ever-active Spirit 
of Christ (1 P. iii, 19)? In the account of Sodom Ρ. (ii. 6) differs 
from J. in laying stress on Lot’s protest against surrounding wicked- 
ness, and on the mercy shown towards him, just as he had done 
pefore in regard to Noah (hereby illustrating the duty of the faithful 
under the present stress); and the moral he draws from the two. 
stories is that ‘God knows how to deliver the godly from trial, as 
well as to keep the wicked under chastisement for the day of judg- 
ment”. P.-alone gives details as to the destruction of Sodom 
(τεφρώσας καταστροφῇ κατέκρινεν), while J. speaks of its present state 
as a warning to future ages. As regards this warning P.’s ὑπόδειγμα 
μελλόντων ἀσεβέσιν is better expressed than J.’s rather confused πρό- 
κεινται δεῖγμα πυρὸς αἰωνίου δίκην ὑπέχουσαι. In ver. 8 J. turns to the 
libertines and declares that they are guilty of like sins with these 
sinners of the old world: they defile the flesh, make light of authority 
and rail at “glories” (as the men of Sodom did towards the angels), 
and this they do because they are still buried in a carnal sleep (cf. 
Eph. v. 14). These men (ver. 10, οὗτοι δέ) rail at things beyond 
their ken, while they surrender themselves like brute beasts to the 
guidance of their appetites, and thus bring about their own destruc- 
tion. P. (ii, 10) combines part of J.’s description of the men of 
Sodom, who went ὀπίσω σαρκὸς ἑτέρας (for which he substitutes ὀπίσω 
σαρκὸς ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ μιασμοῦ πορευομένους) with J.’s condemnation of the 
libertines as despising authority,? and predicates both characteristics 
of the wicked, whom God keeps under chastisement for the day of 
judgment. Then turning to the libertines he exclaims against them 
as “headstrong and shameless (τολμηταί, cf. ἐτόλμησεν, J. ver. 9) men 
that shrink not from railing at glories” (ii. 10). In ii. 12 he goes on, 
as J. does in ver. 10, with a οὗτοι δέ, “these are like brute beasts ’’, 
Apparently he wants to bring out more fully the force of J.’s dca 
φυσικῶς ἐπίστανται, ἐν τούτοις φθείρονται by the periphrasis γεγεννημένα 
φυσικὰ εἰς ἅλωσιν καὶ φθοράν and ἐν τῇ φθορᾷ αὐτῶν φθαρήσονται. That 
is, while J. simply states that the libertines are destroyed through 


1For the connexion between the darkened heart which refuses to know God, 
and the indulgence in the vilest lusts, see Rom. i. 21-28. 

31 will be noticed that, while J. couples κυριότητα and δόξας as belonging 
to the same category, P. only names the abstract word κυριότητα here, and 
introduces δόξας later on as a concrete example. 


216 INTRODUCTION 


their indulgence in their animal instincts, P. draws out the compari: 
son to the brute beasts, ‘‘ which are born mere creatures of instinct, 
with a view to capture and slaughter,” and then adds that the liber- 
tines will share their fate, since they mock at that higher world 
which is beyond their ken. Here there can be no doubt that P.’s 
language is far more obscure than that of J. Even J. is not quite 
clear. The true antithesis would have been “they rail at what 
transcends the senses, they admire what appeals to the senses and 
appetites’’ (and yet these are the causes of their ruin). Is it pos- 
sible that P., writing with an imperfect recollection of J., understood 
ἐν τούτοις φθείρονται to mean “perish among them,” 1.6., among the 
brutes ? 

We have now to consider the very curious verse interposed be- 
tween J. vv. 8 and 10, P. 11. 10 and 12. In J. it runs: “ Michael, the 
archangel, when he was disputing with the devil about the body of 
Moses, did not venture to bring a judgment of railing, but said, ‘the 
Lord rebuke thee’’’: in P. ‘‘ whereas angels, though greater in 
power and might, do not venture to bring against them a railing 
judgment before the Lord”. The former is a little difficult, but 
with the help of the Assumptio Mosis we can understand that, if the 
chief of the archangels abstained from using any contemptuous ex- 
pression against Satan, and contented himself with making his appeal 
to God, much more should frail and sinful mortals abstain from 
slighting language about the powers of the invisible world. What, 
however, is to be made of P? Standing by itself, it is merely a 
riddle, for which the answer is to be foundin J. That is to say, P. 
wrote with J.’s sentence in his mind, but for some reason or other 
chose to eliminate the points essential for its intelligibility. What 
was his reason? The same, | think, which led him to omit the 
details as to the fall of the angels, which are mainly derived from 
the Book of Enoch, in ii. 4, and the reference to the preaching of 
Enoch below. He objects, that is, to make use of these apocryphal 
writings, and generalises the story by dropping the proper names 
and by twice changing a singular into a plural (ἄγγελοι, αὐτῶν). So, 
too, a vague παρὰ Κυρίῳ takes the place of ἐπιτιμήσαι σοι Κύριος, and 
the vagueness is increased by the use of the indeterminate αὐτῶν and 
by the omission of the object of the comparative μείζονες. In fact 
the sentence is meaningless except to one who was already ac- 
quainted with its parallelin J., though it may perhaps be true, as 
Dr. Bigg suggests, that P. felt himself justified in his generalisation 
by the remembrance of an obscure passage in the Book of Enoch. 

I go on to J. ver. 11, ‘‘ Woe to them, for they have followed in 


INTRODUCTION . 217 


the steps of Cain, and been carried away in the error of Balaam for 
gain, and lost themselves in the rebellion of Korah. These are 
sunken rocks in your love-feasts, where they join your feast without 
any feeling of religious reverence, caring only for their own enjoy- 
ment. They are clouds without water, scudding before the wind; 
trees without fruit in the fruit-bearing season, twice dead, torn up by 
the roots; raging waves foaming out their own shame; wandering 
stars for which the blackness of darkness is reserved for ever.” This 
passage corresponds to P. ii. 13-17, but, in the latter, the order is con- 
siderably altered and there are various additions and omissions. 
Balaam (who is also prominent in the Apocalypse ii. 14) is the only one 
of the old hzresiarchs referred to, but his story is given at more length 
in ti. 15 16: “ They (the libertines) have wandered from the straight 
path, following the path of Balaam, who loved the wages of un- 
righteousness and was convicted of his error by the dumb ass, which 
spoke with human voice and stayed the prophet’s madness”. Here 
P. clenches the comparison made before (ii. 1) between the false 
prophet of the O.T. and the false teacher of the N.T., and brings 
out again the motive of covetousness (see above 11. 3 and ii. 15). 
Has he any special reason for introducing the story of the ass re- 
buking the prophet ? We may compare other passages in which 
God is represented as choosing the foolish things of this world to 
confound the wise (1 Cor. i. 27, Ps. viii. 2), or in which men are 
called upon to learn a lesson from animals, as Isa. i. 3, Jer. viii. 7, 
Prov. vi. 6, Job xii. 7. Possibly P. may be thinking of the scorn 
entertained for simple believers by those who called themselves 
Gnostics (see below ii. 18). 

J. ver. 12 appears with some remarkable alterations in P. ii. 13, 
σπίλοι καὶ μῶμοι ἐντρυφῶντες ἐν ταῖς ἀπάταις αὐτῶν συνευωχούμενοι ὑμῖν. 
Here σπίλοι and ἀπάταις are substituted for σπιλάδες and ἀγάπαις in J. 
Some editors read ἀγάπαις with B, but the addition of αὐτῶν suits 
much better with ἀπάταις. J. speaks of dydmats ὑμῶν. It was natural 
of course that the wolves should seek to find their way into the 
sheep-folds; but can we suppose that the faithful would enter the 
love feasts of the libertines? Moreover the change of an original 
ἀγάπαις to ἀπάταις by a copyist is hardly conceivable, while the re- 
verse change to suit J. is most natural. But how are we to account 
for the disappearance of the important—we might almost call it the 
indispensable word—dydmy ? In my edition of 2 P., p. cxcv., I have 
suggested that ἀγάπην was the original reading, instead of ἡδονήν, in 
the earlier part of this verse (ἡδονὴν ἡγούμενοι τὴν ἐν ἡμέρᾳ τρυφήν) ; 
where my explanatory note shows how hard it is to make a satis- 


218 INTRODUCTION 


factory distinction between ἡδονήν and τρυφήν. On the other hand 
ἀγάπην gives exactly the sense required “thinking that revelling in 
the daytime makes an ἀγάπη, as may be seen from the quotations 
from Clement given in the passage referred to (cf. too Rom. xiii. 13). 
I account for ἡδονήν by supposing that it was a marginal gloss on 
τρυφήν. The word ἀπάτη is often joined with τρυφή, as shown in the 
explanatory note, and it is wanted here to explain how the libertines 
managed to gain admission to the love-feasts of the Church. We 
have next to ask why σπιλάδες should have been changed to σπίλοι. 
The former word is a daring metaphor even among the metaphors 
which accompany it in J., but quite out of place here, and P. sub- 
stitutes for it the similar sounding σπίλος found in Eph. v. 27, of 
which the derivatives ἄσπιλος and σπιλόω occur elsewhere in P. and 
J. Are we to suppose that P. intentionally replaced J.’s words by 
others of similar sound, in order not to startle people who were 
already familiar with them? or was it the unconscious action of the 
mind, calling up similar sounds, as in rhyming or alliteration? The 
latter seems to me the more probable explanation. 

P. returns to J.’s metaphors in ii. 17, where he splits up νεφέλαι 
ἄνυδροι ὑπὸ ἀνέμων παραφερόμεναι into two, πηγαὶ dvudpo and ὀμίχλαι 
ὑπὸ λαίλαπος ἐλαυνόμεναι, perhaps because he regarded J.’s expression 
as superfluous, and also because he thus provides distinct pictures of 
present disappointment (the well) and future uncertainty (the cloud). 
He omits the fruitless trees, the stormy waves and wandering stars 
as unsuited to his purpose, but inappropriately appends to his last 
metaphor, the clause in which J. describes the doom of the wander- 
ing stars, οἷς ὁ ζόφος τοῦ σκότους τετήρηται. Of course the gender 
shows that P. intends this clause to apply to the persons whom he 
has just figuratively described, as it is indeed applied by J. himself 
in ver. 6, but it loses the aptness which it has in J. ver. 13, and thus 
supplies another convincing proof of the priority of J. How could the 
latter have had the patience to gather the scattered fragments out of 
P. in order to form the splendid cluster of figures in vv. 12, 13? 

- We have still to consider the insertion in P. (ii. 13), ἀδικούμενοι μισθὸν 
ἀδικίας, which commences the loose series of participles ending in ii. 
15. Ifthe participle is omitted, this phrase recalls J. ver. 11, τῇ πλάνῃ 
τοῦ Βαλαὰμ μισθοῦ ἐξεχύθησαν, and is repeated again in 11. 15; but.é&- 
κούμενοι is difficult. Apparently P. intends his paradoxical phrase to 
correspond to J.’s οὐαί : the libertines are miserable, because they 
are, as they think, “‘robbed of (or ‘robbed as’) the reward of their 
iniquity’. The following participles gave a striking and powerful 
description of the evil influence which these men exercise over 


INTRODUCTION 219 


unstable souls, ὀφθαλμοὺς ἔχοντες μεστοὺς μοιχαλίδος καὶ ἀκαταπαύστους 
ἁμαρτίας, δελεάζοντες ψυχὰς ἀστηρίκτους (cf. γεγεννημένα εἰς ἅλωσιν, ti. 12), 
καρδίαν γεγυμνασμένην πλεονεξίας ἔχοντες, κατάρας τέκνα. Perhaps P. 
may intend this partly to take the place of J.’s fine figure κύματα 
ἄγρια θαλάσσης ἐπαφρίζοντα τὰς ἑαυτῶν αἰσχύνας. 

In vv. 14, 15 J. gives the prophecy of Enoch, the seventh from 
Adam, which simply announces the future judgment on impious deeds 
and words. To this P. makes no direct reference, but, as I have 
before suggested, it may have been one reason for speaking of Noah 
as the eighth. In ver. 16 (perhaps taken from the Assumption of 
Moses) J. goes on to describe the libertines as “murmuring and dis- 
contented, walking after their own lusts, whose mouth λαλεῖ ὑπέρογκα, 
and who flatter others for the sake of advantage”. To the same 
effect P. (ii. 18) speaks of them as uttering ὑπέρογκα ματαιότητος. by 
which they seduce through the lusts of the flesh those who were 
just escaping from heathen error. In ii. 19-22 P. is mostly indepen- 
dent of J., but I have already noticed that ἐλευθερίαν ἐπαγγελλόμενοι 
may be an echo of J. ver. 4, χάριτα μετατιθέντες eis ἀσέλγειαν. He con- 
tinues, εἰ yap ἀποφυγόντες TA μιάσματα Tod κόσμου ἐν ἐπιγνώσει τοῦ κυρίου 
καὶ σωτῆρος ἸΙησοῦ Χριστοῦ, words which recall what he had said ini. 4, 
ἀποφυγόντες τῆς ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ φθορᾶς, . . . διὰ τῆς ἐπιγνώσεως 

ες τοῦ Θεοῦ καὶ Ἰησοῦ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν, and goes on to give an impressive 
warning against the dangers of backsliding, in which he borrows from 
J. ver. 3, ὑποστρέψαι ἐκ τῆς παραδοθείσης αὐτοῖς ἁγίας ἐντολῆς, concluding 
with the proverb of the dog and the sow returning to their foulness 
after being cleansed from it. 

In the third chapter of P. we go back againtoJ. The readers are 
addressed as ἀγαπητοί in P. iii. 1 asin J. ver. 17. In both, they are 
bidden to remember the words of the Apostles, warning them against 
mockers who should come in the last days, walking after their own 
lusts. To this P. adds (iii. 1, 2) ‘‘This is the second letter 1 am 
writing to you, and in both 1 stir up your sincere mind by calling on 
you to remember the command of the Lord and Saviour spoken by 
your Apostles”. Since in i. 16, he had used the phrase ἐγνωρίσαμεν 
ὑμῖν τὴν τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν παρουσίαν, it would seem that P. must himself 
be included among “your Apostles”. He further bids them “re- 
member the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets,” 
recurring in this to what he had said in i. 19. What are we to 
understand by the allusion to a previous letter? Our first thought 
is naturally of 1 P. But is there anything in it which would answer 
to the description here given? Many have denied this, because they 
thought that the contents of the prophecy, as given in J. ver. 18, were 


220 INTRODUCTION 


included in P.’s reference to an earlier Epistle. J. there says, ὅτι 
ἔλεγον ὑμῖν "Ew ἐσχάτου χρόνου ἔσονται ἐμπαῖκται κ-τιλ., that is, he asserts 
that the words quoted by him were words which were often in the 
mouth of the Apostles. On the other hand P. makes a clear separa- 
tion between iii. 2 and iii. 3 by inserting the phrase τοῦτο πρῶτον 
γινώσκοντες, which he had previously used in i. 20, not to introduce a 
particular prophecy, but to lay down how prophecy was to be under- 
stood. The reference to a former letter is therefore restricted by’ 
P. to iii. 2, bidding the readers pay heed to the words of the 
prophets and the apostles. If we turn now to 1 P. i. 10-12, περὶ ἧς 
σωτηρίας ἐξεζήτησαν. . . προφῆται ot περὶ τῆς εἰς ὑμᾶς χάριτος 
προφητεύσαντες . . . οἷς ἀπεκαλύφθη ὅτι οὐχ ἑαυτοῖς, ὑμῖν δὲ διηκόνουν 
αὐτά, ἃ νῦν ἀνηγγέλη ὑμῖν διὰ τῶν εὐαγγελισαμένων ὑμᾶς 
πνεύματι ἁγίῳ (cf. 1 P. i. 16), we shall find an exact correspond- 
ence to what is stated here. The words τῶν προειρημένων ῥημάτων 
(J. ver. 17, P. iii. 2) remind us of J. ver. 4, ot πάλαι προγεγραμμένοι εἰς 
τοῦτο τὸ κρίμα (though no doubt the immediate reference there is to 
the prophecy of Enoch) and of P. it. 3, οἷς τὸ κρίμα ἔκπαλαι οὐκ ἀργεῖ. 
In citing the prophecy, P. adds the emphatic ἐν ἐμπαιγμονῇ, which 
may be compared with ἐν τῇ φθορᾷ αὐτῶν καὶ φθαρήσονται of ti. 12, and 
with the reiterated ἀσεβεῖς of J. ver. 15 and κατὰ τὰς ἐπιθυμίας πορευόμενοι 
of J. vv. 16 and 18. 

In iti. 4, P., omitting J..s somewhat obscure ver. 19, οὗτοί εἰσιν ot 
ἀποδιορίζοντες, ψυχικοί, πνεῦμα μὴ ἔχοντες, oes on to specify in what 
the mockery of the ἐμπαῖκται consisted. They said that the promise 
of the coming of Christ (to which P. had borne witness in i. 16) re- 
mained unfulfilled, and that the world was not liable to the catastro- 
phic changes predicted as accompaniments of the final judgment. 
There is a little awkwardness in P.’s wording, ἀπ᾿ ἀρχῆς κτίσεως fol- 
lowing ἀφ᾽ ἧς ἐκοιμήθησαν, but it is a very natural blending of two ob- 
jections. I cannot think that if J. had known this verse, which gives 
so much point to the preceding prophecy, he would have refrained 
from inserting it. P. gives a double answer in iii. 5-10: (a) as the 
world was created out of water by the word of God, so, owing to! 
the same word, it was destroyed through water, and will be destroyed 
again by fire on the day of judgment (cf. Jude vv. 6, 7, P. ii. 3, 4, 
9); (Ὁ) God is not limited to days and years. If He waits, it is from 
His long-suffering patience, because He desires that all should repent 
and be saved. We may compare this with P.’s use of the O.T. types 
of judgment to point out proofs of mercy in the case of Noah and 
Lot (ii. 5, 7), in contrast with the severer tone of J. vv. 5-7. In iti. 10 


1 Reading δι᾽ ὅν, for which see my edition of 2 P. 


INTRODUCTION 221 


P. bids his readers make a practical use of the knowledge that the 
Lord is about to come unexpectedly. ‘‘Do not be blind to the 
symptoms of the breaking up of the frame of nature (perhaps a re- 
ference to volcanic eruptions and earthquakes). Make ready for the 
coming of the day of God by the practice of holiness and piety. 
Look forward to the fulfilment of the promise of the reign of 
righteousness in a new earth and heaven.”’ 

At this point J. and P. again come together in J. ver. 20 and P. iti. 
14, both commencing a new section with ἀγαπητοί. J.’s exhortation 
to his readers “to build themselves up on their most holy faith and 
keep themselves in love’ has been already used by P., as we have 
seen, ini. 5-7. His reference to the Spirit’s help in prayer may be 
compared with P. i. 20 on the inspiration of the prophets. His 
phrase in ver. 21, προσδεχόμενοι τὸ ἔλεος τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ 
«εἰς ζωὴν αἰώνιον is taken up in the προσδοκῶντας of P. iii. 12 and προσ- 
δοκῶμεν of iii, 13, and again in iii. 14, while the goal eis ζωὴν αἰώνιον may 
be compared with eis τὴν αἰώνιον βασιλείαν in P, i. 11. P. inserts 
ἄσπιλοι καὶ ἀμώμητοι (cf. 1 P.1. 19) from J.’s ἀμώμους in ver. 24, and 
in contrast to his own σπίλοι καὶ μῶμοι in ii. 13, and to J.’s éomdo- 
“μένον in ver. 23. ἐν εἰρήνῃ looks back to J. ver. 2and P. i. 2. While 
in vv. 22, 23 we have J.’s stern rule for the treatment of backsliders, 
P. gives utterance again (iii. 15) to the more hopeful view of iii. 9, 
and claims for it the inspired support of Paul. ‘‘ Yet Paul’s letters, 
wise and good as they are, offer some difficulties, which have been 
misunderstood and perverted, like the rest of the Bible,! by the un- 
learned and unstable to their own destruction.” The word σωτηρία 
jn iii. 15 reminds us that J. had originally intended to write περὶ τῆς 
κοινῆς σωτηρίας (ver. 3) and that his purpose is apparently carried 
out to a certain extent in these last verses from 20 onwards. In 
ver. 24 J. begins an Ascription partly borrowed from St. Paul, ad- 
dressed “‘to Him who is able to keep His people free from stumbling 
(cf. P. i. 10) and present them before His glory in exceeding joy” 
(cf. P. i. 11). P. bids his readers, ‘knowing these things before- 
hand (see above i. 12, iti. 2) to be on their guard, that they may not 
be led away by the error (J. ver. 11, P. ii. 18) of the wicked (P. ii. 
7, cf. J. ver. 23, ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ), and so fall from their own steadfast- 
mess” (cf. P. i. 12, ii. 14, ili, 16). J.’s ἐν ἀγαλλιάσει soars higher 
than the lesson which P. here inculcates: it may be compared, as 
we have seen, with the πλουσίως ἐπιχορηγηθήσεται of i. 11. P. con- 
tinues his exhortation in iii. 18, αὐξάνετε ἐν χάριτι καὶ γνώσει, for which 


1 For the justification of this rendering see explanatory notes in my edition of 
Ξὰ ae 


220 INTRODUCTION 


we may compare χάρις πληθυνθείη in i. 2 and ταῦτα πλεονάζοντα in 1. 8, 
also J. ver. 4. The Ascription in P. is much simpler than that in J., 
being addressed to our Saviour Jesus Christ, while J.’s is addressed 
μόνῳ Θεῷ σωτῆρι ἡμῶν διὰ ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν. P. has δόξα 
only, while J. has the full liturgical form, δόξα, μεγαλωσύνη, κράτος, καὶ 
ἐξουσία. P. has καὶ νῦν καὶ eis ἡμέραν αἰῶνος, while J. has πρὸ παντὸς 
τοῦ αἰῶνος καὶ νῦν καὶ εἰς πάντας τοὺς αἰῶνας, concluding with ἀμήν, 
which is omitted in P. by W.H. after Cod. B. Cf. A. J. Wilson, 
Ὁ. of Theol. Stud. vol. viii. 75 on Emphasis in N.T. 

To sum up: What do we find to be the main points in which the 
two Epistles agree, what the points in which they differ? Both 
agree in making faith, which is itself the gift of God (P. i. 1, 
λαχοῦσιν πίστιν), the foundation of the Christian life (J. wv. 3, 20, 
P. i. 1, 5): both agree that its commencement lies in the divine 
call (J. ver. 1, P. i. 3, 10). The call was sealed in baptism for the 
forgiveness of sin (J. ver. 5 in connexion with 1 Cor. x. 1, 2, P. 1. 9), 
but we have to make our calling sure through good works (P. i. 10), to 
build ourselves up on the foundation of the faith (J. ver. 20, P. 1. 5- 
7), to keep ourselves in the love of God by praying with the help of the 
Holy Spirit (J. ver. 20), looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ 
(which shall be fully revealed) in the life eternal (J. ver. 21). God our 
Saviour is able to keep us without stumbling and to present us before 
His glory unblemished in joy (J. vv. 24, 25). P. does not expressly 
mention prayer, and he lays more stress on personal effort than J. in 
the words “give diligence that ye may be found in peace, without spot 
and blameless in His sight” iii. 14, “beware lest ye fall from your 
steadfastness, grow in grace”’ iii. 17, 18. So in i. 5-8 he bids his 
readers add all diligence to supply “in your faith energy, in your 
energy knowledge,” etc., and goes on in ver. 10 to say “if ye do these 
things, ye shall never stumble: for thus shall be richly supplied to 
you the entrance into the eternal kingdom”. At the same time he 
ascribes to the divine power “all that pertains to life and godliness, 
through the knowledge of Him who called us by the manifestation of 
His own goodness”. That manifestation has been to us the guarantee 
of most blessed promises, through which we are enabled to become 
partakers of the divine nature (P. i. 3, 4). 

The broad distinction between the two Epistles may be said to 
be that, while J. is throughout occupied with the denunciation 
of evil-doers, except in vv. 1-3 and 20-25, P.’s denunciations are 
mainly confined to a portion of chapter ii, and that the latter 
dwells more upon the mercy of God as shown even in his punish- 
ments. 


INTRODUCTION 223 


The conclusion I have drawn from the above comparison of the 
two Epistles as to the priority of J., is confirmed by the general 
opinion of modern critics, as by Neander, Credner, Ewald, Hilgen- 
feld, Holtzmann, Harnack, Bernhard Weiss, Abbott, Farrar, Salmon, 
above all by Dr. Chase in his excellent article on the “‘ Second Epistle 
of St. Peter’’ in Hastings’ D. of B. It is true some of the best 
authorities speak very doubtfully both of this priority and of the 
authenticity of 2 P. Thus Déllinger, who, in his First Age of the 
Church, had maintained the priority of 2 P., wrote to Dr. Plum- 
mer in the year 1879 that he could no longer hold this opinion 
(Plummer’s St. James and St. Fude 1891, p. 400). See also Plum- 
mer’s St. Fude, p. 268: ‘“‘ While admitting that the case is by no 
means proved, we may be content to retain the priority, as well as the 
authenticity of 2 Peter, as at least the best working hypothesis”. 
And Hort is quoted by Dr. Sanday (Inspiration, p. 347) as saying 
that “If he were asked he should say that the balance of argument 
was against the epistle; and the moment he had done so he should 
begin to think that he might be wrong’’. On the other hand three of 
the most recent critics, Spitta in his Commentary on the two Epistles, 
1885, Dr. Bigg in his International Critical Commentary, ed. 2, 1902, 
and the veteran Zahn in his E7nleitung in das N.T., ed. 3, 1906, have 
no hesitation in maintaining the priority and authenticity of 2P. | 
proceed to consider the arguments which have been adduced by 
them or by others in favour of that view.! 

(1) Assuming the genuineness of the two Epistles, it is easier, 
in a case of evident borrowing, to suppose that the borrower should 
be the comparatively obscure Jude, rather than Peter, the foremost 
of the Apostles. 

(2) Jude seems to acknowledge his obligations to Peter in ver. 4 
ot πάλαι προγεγραμμένοι εἰς τοῦτο τὸ κρίμα... τὸν μόνον δεσπότην 
ἀρνούμενοι and in vv. 17, 18 μνήσθητε τῶν ῥημάτων τῶν προειρημένων ὑπὸ 
τῶν ἀποστόλων τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ὅτι ἔλεγον ὑμῖν “Ew ἐσχάτου 
χρόνου ἔσονται ἐμπαῖκται κατὰ τὰς ἑαυτῶν ἐπιθυμίας πορευόμενοι, the 
former verse being regarded as an allusion to P.’s ii. 3 ἐν ὑμῖν ἔσονται 
ψευδοδιδάσκαλοι.. . τὸν ἀγοράσαντα αὐτοὺς δεσπότην ἀρνούμενοι... οἷς 
τὸ κρίμα ἔκπαλαι οὐκ ἀργεῖ, the latter to P. tii. 2, 8 μνησθῆναι τῶν προει- 
ρημένων ῥημάτων ὑπὸ τῶν ἁγίων προφητῶν καὶ τῆς τῶν ἀποστόλων ὑμῶν 
ἐντολῆς τοῦ κυρίου καὶ σωτῆρος, τοῦτο πρῶτον γινώσκοντες ὅτι ἐλεύσονται ἐπ᾽ 
ἐσχάτων τῶν ἡμερῶν ἐν ἐμπαιγμονῇ ἐμπαῖκται κατὰ τὰς ἰδίας ἐπιθυμίας αὐτῶν 
πορευόμενοι. 

1] agree with Dr. Bigg that it is superfluous to consider theories which sup- 


pose 2 P. to be made up of two independent epistles. Its unity, as shown in the 
tarlier part of this chapter, forces itself on the mind of any careful reader. 


224 INTRODUCTION 


(3) The priority of P. is confirmed by the prevailing use of the 
future tense in regard to the innovators, whereas J. uses the past 
or the present; cf. P. ii. 1 ἔσονται, παρεισάξουσιν, ii. 2 ἐξακολουθήσουσιν, 
βλασφημηθήσεται, ii. ὃ ἐμπορεύσονται, with J. ver. 4 παρεισεδύησαν, ver. 
8 μιαίνουσιν, ver. 10 βλασφημοῦσιν and the aorists in ver. 11. 

Dealing with these objections in order, we may concede that, if 
both Epistles are genuine, we should rather have expected the borrow- 
ing to be on the side of the more obscure. Yet the probability is not 
one that can be pressed. Milton and Handel borrowed from men 
much inferior to themselves; Isaiah borrows from. Micah, and 1 P. 
from James. If on the other hand we find reason to believe that 2 
P. was not written by the Apostle, the objection only amounts to 
this, that, though St. Peter himself had borrowed from James in 1 
P., an admirer of St. Peter could not have borrowed from Jude in 2 P. 
With regard to obj. (2), I have pointed out in my note that the word 
τάλαι in J, ver. 4 cannot refer to P., but must be understood of the 
orophecy of Enoch, quoted in J. ver. 15, in which the word ἀσεβεῖς 
(which sums up the judgment in ver. 4), occurs no less than four times 
(if we include the cognate verb and abstract noun). I have also 
pointed out that J. in ver. 17 refers not to any one writer, but to the 
oral teaching of the Apostles, and that P. in iti. 2 does not profess to 
utter any new prophecy, but simply adds to what Jude had said, that 
the teaching of the Apostles rested upon the authority of Christ, and 
that it was in agreement with the teaching of the prophets. As re- 
gards obj. (3), the difference of tense, P. is not consistent in his use of 
the future. We have the pres. in 11. 10 τρέμουσιν, 11. 17 εἰσίν, 11. 18 
δελεάζουσιν, iii, 5 λανθάνει, from which we should conclude that the 
innovators had already begun their work, if not among those to whom 
he writes, yet among other churches, to which J. may have addressed 
himself. Ifthe former Epistle is a product of the second century, the 
writer may have used the future tense to give it verisimilitude, while 
falling at times into the present from inadvertence. 

(4) Spitta asks why, if P. is borrowing from J., he makes no re- 
ference to him, as he does to Paul? It might be enough to ask in 
reply, “‘ Why, if J. borrows from P., does he make no definite acknow- 
ledgment of the fact’’? But we have a parallel case, though no doubt 
on a smaller scale, in the unacknowledged borrowings from the Epistle 
of James in 1 Peter, on which see the Introduction to my edition of 
James, pp. xcviii to οἱ. The reason however for the mention of Paul 
in 2 P. is quite distinct from the acknowledgment of a debt. The 
libertines claimed his authority in behalf of their own views (cf. J. 
ver. 4), and it was necessary for P. to protest against this. 


INTRODUCTION 225 


It would be endless to go into a minute examination of the parallel 
passages which have been cited to prove. the priority of P. I have said 
all that I think need be said about them in the earlier part of this 
chapter and in the explanatory notes of my edition of 2 P. The im- 
pression which they leave on my mind is that in J. we have the first 
thought, in P. the second thought ; that we can generally see a reason 
why P. should have altered J., but very rarely a reason why what we 
read in P. should have been altered to what we find in J. P. is more 
reflective, J. more spontaneous. 


CHAPTER II. 


The Epistle of fude, Author, Style, Authenticity, Circumstances of 
Writing.—The name Judas (Ἰούδας) was naturally in very common 
use among the Jews at the time of the Christian era. It was dear to 
them as having been borne not only by the Eponymos of their tribe, 
but also by their great champion Judas the Maccabee. Two among 
the Twelve bore this name, Judas Iscariot, and the Judas not Iscariot 
(Jn. xiv. 22), who is also called Judas son of James (6 Ἰακώβου, Lk. 
vi. 16, Acts i. 13) and Thaddaeus (Mt. ix. 3, Mk. iii. 18, where some 
MSS. add AeBBaios). Besides these we meet with a Judas among 
the Brethren of the Lord (Mt. xiii. 55, Mk. vi. 3), Judas of Galilee 
(Acts v. 37), Judas surnamed Barsabbas (Acts xv. 22), Judas of 
Damascus (Acts ix. 11). It is therefore not surprising that the writer 
should have added a note of identification, δοῦλος Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, 
ἀδελφὸς δὲ Ἰακώβου. The most famous James in the middle of the 
first century was the head of the Church at Jerusalem and brother 
of the Lord, who also begins his epistle by styling himself simply 
δοῦλος (Θεοῦ καὶ Κυρίου) Ἰησοῦ Xpiotod. Hence it seems probable that 
the addition was made, not merely for the purpose of identification, 
but, like the addition of ἀπόστολος δέ in Tit. i. 1, as giving a reason 
why his words should be received with respect, since he was brother 
of James and therefore one of the Brethren of the Lord. In my 
Introduction to the Epistle of St. James (pp. i-xlvii), I have en- 
deavoured to show that the Brethren of the Lord were sons of Joseph 
and Mary, that they did not join the Church till after the Crucifixion, 
and that none of them was included among the Twelve.! 

Other facts which we learn from the N.T. are (1) that Jude was 
probably either the youngest or the youngest but one of the Brethren 
of the Lord, as he is mentioned last among them in Mt. xiii. 55 ot 
ἀδελφοὶ αὐτοῦ Ἰάκωβος καὶ ᾿Ιωσῆς καὶ Σίμων καὶ “loddas, and last but one 
in Mk. vi. 8 ἀδελφὸς δὲ ᾿Ιακώβου καὶ ᾿Ιωσῆ καὶ ἸΙούδα καὶ Σίμωνος ; (2) 
that the Brethren of the Lord (of course exclusive of James, who 


1See ver. 17, where the writer appears to distinguish between the Apostles 
and himself. 


INTRODUCTION 227 


remained stationary at Jerusalem) were engaged in missionary 
journeys like St. Paul (1 Cor. ix. 5), but that they differed from him 
in the fact that they were married and were accompanied by their 
wives, and also, as we may suppose from Gal. ii. 9, Mt. x. 23, that 
their ministrations were mainly directed to the Jews. In my edition 
of James (p. cxv) I have argued that his Epistle was addressed to 
Jews of the eastern Diaspora and it seems not improbable that Jude, 
writing many years after his brother's death, may have wished to 
supply his place by addressing to the same circle of readers the warn- 
ings which he felt bound to utter under the perilous circumstances 
of the new age. His cousin Symeon, the son of his uncle Clopas, 
had succeeded to the bishopric of Jerusalem (Eus., H.Z., iti., 22, iv., 22, 
' quoted in my edition of James pp. viii foll.), and is said to have been 
crucified a.p. 107 at the age of 1201 (cf. Hegesippus ap. Euseb., H.E., 
iii., 32, ἀπὸ τούτων τῶν αἱρετικῶν κατηγοροῦσι τινὲς Συμεῶνος. . . ὡς ὄντος 
ἀπὸ Δαβὶδ καὶ Χριστιανοῦ. καὶ οὕτως μαρτυρεῖ ἐτῶν ὧν ἑκατὸν εἴκοσιν ἐπὶ 
Τραϊανοῦ Καίσαρος καὶ ὑπατικοῦ ᾿Αττικοῦ). 

Eusebius (H.E., iii., 19) quotes again from Hegesippus an interest- 
ing story of the grandsons of Judas, ‘““who were seized and carried 
to Rome by order of Domitian, whose fears had been excited by the 
report he heard of them as descendants of David, and akin to the 
Messiah. When they were brought before him, he quickly ascertained 
that they were poor men, and that the kingdom they looked forward 
to was not of this world, and accordingly dismissed them as men 
of no importance, and ceased from his persecution of the Church. 
When they returned home, they received special honours, as having 
witnessed to the truth, and also as being kinsmen of the Lord. They 
lived till the time of Trajan.” 

In my Introduction to St. James I have pointed out that his 
Epistle bears marked traces of some characteristics which are found 
in the Lord Himself. I propose to call attention here to some re- 
semblances and differences between the Epistles of the two brothers. 

A. (1) Among the former we may note the tone of undoubting and 
unquestioned authority which pervades the two Epistles, combined 
with the personal humility of the writers. They do not arrogate to 
themselves that relationship which constituted the ground of the 
reverence with which they were regarded by their fellow-believers. 
They are simply servants of Jesus Christ, the Lord of Glory, to whose 
soming, as the righteous Judge, they look forward, whose power still 
manifests itself in works of mercy (James i. 1, ii. 1, v. 8, 9, 14); of 
Jesus Christ, who keeps His people safe to the end, through whom 


1 More probably under 95. 


228 INTRODUCTION 


they hope for eternal life, to deny whom is the climax of impiety, in 
whom the Father is glorified for ever (Jude vv. 1, 4,21, 25). They are 
sharers of a common salvation (Jude ver. 3), they need forgiveness of 
sin like other men (James iii. 2). 

(2) Mental characteristics as exhibited in the two Epistles. 

In my edition of James (p. ccxxix.) 1 have summed up the more 
general qualities of his style in the words “energy, vivacity, and as 
conducive to both, vividness of representation, meaning by the last 
that dislike of mere abstractions, that delight in throwing everything 
into picturesque and dramatic forms, which is so marked a feature 
in our Epistle”. To a certain extent this is true also of Jude, as 
shown in his imaginative power and his frequent use of figurative 
speech. Cf. Jude ver. 8, where the innovators are spoken of as 
dreamers polluting the flesh; ver. 12, where they are compared (1) 
to sunken rocks on which those who meet them at the love-feasts run 
aground and perish, (2) to waterless clouds driven by the wind, (3) 
to trees which have to be rooted up, because they bear no fruit in 
the fruit-bearing season, (4) to wild waves foaming out their own 
shame on the shore, (5) to falling stars which are extinguished in 
everlasting gloom. In ver. 20 the faithful are bidden to build them- 
selves up on their most holy faith; in ver. 23, to save sinners, snatch- 
ing them from the fire ; to hate the garment spotted by the flesh. In 
regard to St. James 1 further illustrated the quality of vividness by “the 
frequent reference to examples such as Abraham, Rahab, Job, Elijah”’. 
In the same way St. Jude gives animation to his warnings by refer- 
ence to the Israelites who perished in the wilderness for their unbelief 
after being saved irom Egypt; to the fallen angels who are reserved 
for the judgment in everlasting chains ; to Sodom and the neighbour- 
ing cities, which sinned in the same way as the angels, and now 
suffer the penalty of eternal fire (vv. 5-7). Reverence for the powers 
of the unseen world is commended by the pattern of the archangel 
Michael, who, even in his dispute with the devil for the body of 
Moses, refused to bring a railing accusation, but committed the case 
to God (vv. 8, 9). Cain and Balaam and Korah are cited as the 
predecessors of the present disturbers of the Church (ver. 11). Enoch 
the seventh from Adam has left us his warning against such men (vv. 14, 
15). ‘You have yourselves heard the same warning from the 
Apostles” (ver. 17). 

(3) For moral strictness and stern severity in rebuking sin, the 
whole of this short Epistle may be compared with such passages as 
James ii. 19, iii. 15, iv. 1-ν. 6. For noble and weighty expression we 
may compare vv. 20, 21, ὑμεῖς δέ, ἀγαπητοί, ἐποικοδομοῦντες ἑαυτοὺς TH 


INTRODUCTION 229 


ἁγιωτάτῃ ὑμῶν πίστει, ἐν πνεύματι ἁγίῳ προσευχόμενοι, ἑαυτοὺς ἐν ἀγάπῃ 
Θεοῦ τηρήσατε, προσδεχόμενοι τὸ ἔλεος τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ εἰς 
ζωὴν αἰώνιον and the final doxology, with the passages which I have 
selected from St. James in p. ccxxviii. The appealing ἀγαπητοί, which 
is thrice found in St. James, is also thrice repeated in Jude. The 
warning against Respect of Persons is found in James ii. 1-9 and in 
Jude ver. 16: that against a murmuring discontented spirit in James i. 
13, iv. 1, v. 9, in Jude vv. 15, 16 ; that against the misuse of the tongue in 
James iii. 1-10, in Jude ver. 16: the charge to labour for the salvation of 
others in James v. 19, 20, in Jude vv. 22, 23. 


For special details of the style of St. Jude see my larger edition, 
pp. xxvi-Ixvi: one point which may be noticed here is his fondness for 
triplets. Thus in ver. 2 we find ἔλεος καὶ εἰρήνη kal ἀγάπη πληθυνθείη. In 

1 2 3 


ver. 4 “the men who were designed for this judgment ” are described 
as ἀσεβεῖς, Thy’ τοῦ Θεοῦ χάριτα μετατιθέντες εἰς ἀσέλγειαν, τὸν μόνον 
1 2 


δεσπότην ἀρνούμενοι. In vv. 3-7 three examples of punishment are ad- 
3 


duced, Israel in the wilderness, the angels who sinned, the overthrow 
of Sodom. In ver. 8 the libertines, σάρκα μὲν μιαίνουσιν, κυριότητα δὲ 
ἀθετοῦσιν, δόξας δὲ βλασφημοῦσιν. [In vv. 9, 10 we have two couplets οὐκ 
ἐτόλμησεν---ἀλλὰ εἶπεν: Goa μὲν οὐκ οἴδασιν---βλασφημοῦσιν, ὅσα δὲ--- 
φθείρονται. In ver. 11 we return to the triplet, Cain, Balaam, Korah. 
[In vv. 12, 13 we have a quintet of metaphors, hidden rocks, rainless 
clouds, dead trees, turbid waves, falling stars. In ver. 15 again two 
couplets ποιῆσαι κρίσιν---ἐλέγξαι, περὶ πάντων ὧν ἠσέβησαν---ὧν édddyoar. | 
In ver. 16 we return to the triplet πορευόμενοι---λαλοῦντες (disguised in 
the form καὶ τὸ στόμα λαλεῖ ὑπέρογκα)---θαυμάζοντες. So in ver. 17, the 
word—the Apostles—the Lord. Ver. 18 does not admit of sub- 
division. Ver. 19 has the triplet ἀποδιορίζοντες, ψυχικοί, πνεῦμα μὴ 
ἔχοντες. Vv. 20 and 21 have a double triplet, ἐποικοδομοῦντες--προσευ- 
χόμενοι--προσδεχόμενοι and πνεῦμα ἅγιον---Θεός---᾿Ἰησοῦς Χριστός. Ver. 
22 has the marked triplet ots μὲν---οὖς δὲ---οὖς δέ, Ver. 24 has a 
couplet, φυλάξαι---στῆσαι. Ver. 25 has a quartet δόξα, μεγαλωσύνη; 
κράτος, ἐξουσία, followed by the triplet πρὸ παντὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος, καὶ νῦν, 
καὶ εἰς πάντας τοὺς αἰῶνας, thus closing with a septet. Compare the 
stress laid on the fact that Enoch was seventh from Adam, ver, 14. 
There are some traces of the triplet in St. James, as in i. 14, ἕκαστος 
πειράζξεται ὑπὸ τῆς ἰδίας ἐπιθυμίας .---εἶτα i ἐπιθυμία τίκτει ἁμαρτίαν, ἡ δὲ 
ἁμαρτία ἀποκύει θάνατον, ver. 19 ἔστω δὲ πᾶς ἄνθρωπος ταχὺς εἰς τὸ ἀκοῦσαι, 
βραδὺς εἰς τὸ λαλῆσαι, βραδὺς εἰς ὀργήν, ii. 28 ἐπίστευσεν ᾿Αβραὰμ τῷ Θεῷ, 
καὶ ἐλογίσθη αὐτῷ εἰς δικαιοσύνην, καὶ φίλος Θεοῦ ἐκλήθη, iii. 6, ἡ γλῶσσα 
VOL. V. 15 


230 INTRODUCTION 


ἡ σπιλοῦσα, καὶ φλογίζουσα---καὶ φλογιζομένη, iv.. 8, ἐγγίσατε τῷ Θεῷ--- 
καθαρίσατε χεῖρας--ἁγνίσατε καρδίας, SO iv. 9, v. 17, 18. Perhaps we 
may find a septet in the beautiful description of heavenly wisdom (iii. 
17) πρῶτον μὲν ἁγνή, ἔπειτα εἰρηνική, ἐπιεικής, εὐπειθής, μεστὴ ἐλέους καὶ 
καρπῶν ἀγαθῶν, ἀδιάκριτος, ἀνυπόκριτος. But the distinctive mark of St. 
James’s style is “ paronomasia ” passing at times into sucha climax as 
we find in i. 14, 15 quoted above and in i. 3, 4, τὸ δοκίμιον ὑμῶν τῆς 
πίστεως κατεργάζεται ὑπομονήν, ἣ δὲ ὑπομονὴ ἔργον τέλειον ἐχέτω, ἵνα ἦτε 
τέλειοι. See pp. ccxxii f. of my edition. 

Another characteristic which may be noted is the love of forcible 
antithesis as in J. ver. 10, ὅσα μὲν οὐκ οἴδασιν βλασφημοῦσιν, ὅσα δὲ φυσικῶς 
ὡς τὰ ἄλογα Lda ἐπίστανται, ἐν τούτοις φθείρονται. ΑΒ regards vocabulary, 
the most striking resemblance is the occurrence of ψυχικός as opposed 
to πνευματικός, Of which the earliest biblical example is in James iii. 
15, but this had been adopted by Paul (1 Cor. ii. 10 foll.) before it 
was made use of by Jude. 

B. (1) The differences between the two Epistles are hardly less 
marked: Jude evidently belongs to a much later period of Christian 
development. James, as I have endeavoured to show in the Intro- 
duction to his Epistle, wrote about the year 45 a.p. before any of the 
other canonical. books was in existence, and his theological position 
is that of the early Church described in the opening chapters of the 
Acts. Jude is familiar with the writings of St. Paul. He is familiar 
with the terms σωτήρ and σωτηρία (vv. ὃ and 25): in wv. 20, 21 he 
brings together the three Persons of the Trinity; he addresses those 
to whom he writes in Pauline language as κλητοί (ver. 1) and ἅγιοι 
(ver. 3), and uses forms of ascription and doxology closely resembling 
those which occur in St. Peter and St. Paul. Their “ most holy faith” 
is a “tradition once delivered to the saints” (vv. 4, 20): they are 
bidden to ‘‘ remember the words of the Apostles, how they told them 
that in the last time there should come scoffers” (vv. 17, 18). The 
error which he combats appears to be a misgrowth of St. Paul’s 
teaching in regard to a salvation of free grace, “not of works, lest 
any man should boast” (ver. 4). Many of the features which he dis- 
tinguishes are such as we find delineated in St. Paul’s farewell to the 
Ephesian Church, and in some of his Epistles, especially those to 
Titus and Timothy. 

(2) Another difference might seem to be Jude’s repeated references 
to Pseudepigrapha such as the book of Enoch and the Assumption 
of Moses (on which see the next chapter) and his readiness to give 
credence to fanciful legends such as the fall of the Watchers, and 
the contention for the body of Moses. Credulity of this kind seems to 


INTRODUCTION 231 


be far apart from the strong practical sense of James. Yet there are 
signs that the latter was not unacquainted with rabbinical traditions. 
Spitta even goes so far as to trace most of his teaching to pre- 
Christian sources. I have argued against this view in ch. vii. 2 of 
my Introduction to his Epistle; but my notes on i. 8 (δίψυχος) and 
iv. 8, 9 ἁγνίσατε καρδίας, δίψυχοι: ταλαιπωρήσατε, Suggest a connexion 
with an apocryphal writing quoted in Clem. Rom. i. 23 ἡ γραφὴ αὕτη, 
ὅπσυ λέγει Ταλαίπωροί εἰσιν οἱ Sipuxou! and identified by Lightfoot and 
Spitta with Eldad and Modad (on which see Herm., Vis., ii., 3), by 
Hilgenfeld with the Assumption of Moses. The phrase in iv. 14, 
ἀτμὶς γάρ ἐστε πρὸς ὀλίγον φαινομένη, has been traced by some to 
another apocryphal quotation found in Clem. i. 17 ἐγὼ δέ εἰμι ἀτμὶς 
ἀπὸ κύθρας, which Hilgenfeld also supposes to be taken from the 
Assumption of Moses. The phrase κόσμος ἀδικίας in James iii. 6 is 
found in Enoch xlviii. 7. The Testaments of the Pairiarchs, which 
also coniain quotations from Enoch (such as Sim. 5 ἑώρακα ἐν xapa- 
κτῆρι γραφῆς Ἐνώχ, Levi 10 βίβλος Ἐνὼχ τοῦ δικαίου, ἐδ. 14, ἔγνων ἀπὸ 
γραφῆς ᾿Ενὼχ ὅτι ἐπὶ τέλει ἀσεβήσετε, 7b. 16, Fuda 18, Benj. 9, Zab. 8, 
Nepht. 4. ἐν γραφῇ ἁγίᾳ ᾿Ενὼχ ὅτι... ποιήσετε κατὰ πᾶσαν ἀνομίαν 
Σοδόμων), furnish several parallels quoted in my note on James iv. 7 
ἀντίστητε TH διαβόλῳ Kal φεύξεται ἀφ᾽ ὑμῶν. The words which im- 
mediately precede (ἐγγίσατε τῷ Θεῷ καὶ ἐγγίσει ὑμῖν) are not unlike 
another quotation which occurs in Herm. Vis. ii. 3, ἐγγὺς Θεὸς τοῖς 
ἐπιστρεφομένοις, ὡς γέγραπται ἐν τῷ Ἐλδὰτ καὶ Μωδὰτ τοῖς προφητεύσασιν 
ἐν τῇ ἐρήμῳ τῷ λαῷ. James has also been credited with a knowledge 
of the Sibylline writings on the ground of the phrase ἰοῦ θανατηφόρου 
which occurs in iii. 8 and also in Sib. Prooem. 71. 


εἰσὶ θεοὶ μερόπων δηλήτορες 2 «οὗτοι» ἀβούλων, 
τῶν δὴ κἀκ στόματος χεῖται θανατηφόρος ἰός. 


But if there is borrowing, it is just as likely to be on the other 
side. The strange expression τροχὸς γενέσεως in iii. 6 is regarded as 
‘Orphic by some, but it seems to have been used by the Orphic writers 
in a different sense, viz. that of the endless changes of metem- 
psychosis. 

(3) Another difference which strikes one on reading the two 
epistles is that while the former is full of instruction for the present 
time, the bulk of the latter is made up of denunciations, which have 
very much lost their force. To a modern reader it is curious rather 

1 The quotation, as given more fully in Clem. Rom. ii. 11, contains the some- 


what rare word ἀκαταστασία, which is also used by James iii. 16. 
2MS. δολοητορες. Gefficken reads δόλῳ ἡγητῆρες. 


232 INTRODUCTION 


than edifying, with the exception of the beginning and end (vv. 1, 2 
and 20-25). This is no doubt to be explained by what is stated of 
the purport of the letter in ver. 8. It was called out by a sudden 
emergency, to guard against an immediate pressing danger, and was 
substituted for a treatise περὶ τῆς κοινῆς σωτηρίας which Jude had 
hoped to send (ver. 3), and which would probably have been more in 
the tone and spirit of vv. 20 ἢ 


The Epistle of Jude was recognised as canonical in the Third 
Council of Carthage, a.p. 397 (Westcott on the Canon, p. 566), with 
which agree Jerome (Westcott, p. 580) and Augustine (De Doctr. 
Christiana, ii. 12). Jerome, however (De vir. iil. iv.), mentions that, 
owing to the use made of the apocryphal Enoch, the epistle of Jude a 
plerisque reicitur. So Eusebius H.E. ii. 23, “‘ Not many old writers 
have mentioned the Epistle of James, nor yet the Epistle of Jude, 
which is also one of the seven so-called Catholic Epistles, though we 
know that these have been publicly used with the rest in most 
churches.” Jb. iii. 25, ““Among the controverted books, which are 
nevertheless well known and recognised by most, we class the Epistle 
circulated under the name of James and that of Jude.” Cyril ot 
Jerusalem (4. 386 a.p.) acknowledged both Jude and 2 P. In Asia 
Minor both Jude and 2 P. were recognised as canonical by Grégory 
Naz. (d. c. 391). In Alexandria Didymus (d. 394) wrote comments 
on the Catholic Epistles, especially defending Jude from the attacks 
made upon him as having made use of apocryphal books. Athanasius 
(d. 373) in his list of the books of the N.T. “agrees exactly with our 
own Canon” (Westcott, p. 520). Origen (In Matt. x. 17) says of Jude 
ἔγραψεν ἐπιστολήν, ὀλιγόστιχον μέν, πεπληρωμένην δὲ τῶν τῆς οὐρανίου 
χάριτος ἐρρωμένων λόγων. In the same treatise (xvii. 30) he quotes Jude 
6, adding words which signify that it was not universally received, et 
δὲ καὶ τὴν ᾿Ιούδα πρόσοιτό τις ἐπιστολήν. Clement of Alexandria com- 
mented on Jude in his Hypotyposes (Eus. H.E. vi. 14)—the comment 
is still extant in the Latin translation—and quotes him by name (Paed. 
iii. 44, 45) with commendation, διδασκαλικώτατα ἐκτίθεται τὰς εἰκόνας τῶν 
κρινομένων. He quotes him again Strom. iti. 11, and, without naming 
him, in Strom. vi. 65. Tertullian (De Cult. Fem. 3) says ‘‘ Enoch 
apud Judam apostolum testimonium possidet”. It appears in the 
Muratorian Canon (c. 170 a.p.), “ Epistola sane Judae et superscripti 
Johannis duae in catholicis habentur”. Theophilus of Antioch (ad 
Autol. ii. 15) seems to allude to Jude 13 in the words quoted in my 
note on that verse. Athenagoras (c. 180) speaks (§ 24, p. 130 Otto) 
of the fallen angels in a manner which suggests acquaintance with 


INTRODUCTION 35 


Jude ver. 6, ἀγγέλους τοὺς μὴ τηρήσαντας τὴν ἑαυτῶν ἀρχήν. (Of the 
angels some) ἔμειναν ἐφ᾽ οἷς αὐτοὺς ἐποίησεν καὶ διέταξεν ὁ Θεός, οἱ δὲ 
ἐνύβρισαν καὶ τῇ τῆς οὐσίας ὑποστάσει καὶ τῇ ἀρχῇ, and he adds that he 
asserts this on the authority of the prophets, which may perhaps refer 
both to Enoch and Jude. The form of salutation in Jude 2 ἔλεος kat 
εἰρήνη καὶ ἀγάπη πληθυνθείη is found in Mart. Polyc. Inscr. and Polyc. 
ad Phil. The earliest reference however to Jude is probably to be 
found in 2 Pet., which, as we have seen in the preceding Chapter I., 
is largely copied from him. There appears also to be an allusion to 
it in Didache ii. 7, οὐ μισήσεις πάντα ἄνθρωπον, ἀλλὰ obs μὲν ἐλέγξεις, περὶ 
δὲ ὧν προσεύξῃ, οὗς δὲ ἀγαπήσεις, cf. Jude 22. Jude’s epistle was 
included in the Old Latin Version, but not in the Peshitto. 

The most important passage in Jude bearing upon the circum- 
stances of its composition is ver. 17, where the readers are bidden to 
call to mind the words formerly spoken to them by the Apostles of our 
Lord Jesus Christ (which would fit in with the suggestion that it was 
addressed to the Syrian churches) ὅτι ἔλεγον ὑμῖν "Ew ἐσχάτου χρόνου 
ἔσονται ἐμπαῖκται, the latter words showing that these communications 
of the Apostles had now ceased, either by their death or by their re- 
moval from Jerusalem. Jude recognises that ‘the last time,” of 
which they had preached, had now arrived. The long retrospect which 
these words imply agrees with the far-away note of ver. 3, παρακαλῶν 
ἐπαγωνίζεσθαι TH ἅπαξ παραδοθείσῃ τοῖς ἁγίοις πίστει, AS contrasted with 
such passages as Luke iv. 21 σήμερον πεπλήρωται ἧ γραφή αὕτη, though 
we must not forget that the idea of a Christian tradition is familiar 
to St. Paul, and that there are other examples in the N.T. of the 
objective use of πίστις. 

It has been argued that this epistie must have been written before 
70, or it would have contained some reference to the destruction of 
Jerusalem among the other notable judgments of God. We may 
grant that this is what we should have expected, if the letter were 
written shortly afterwards, though even then it is a possible view that 
a patriotic Jew might shrink from any further allusion to so terrible a 
subject, beyond the reference to the destruction in the wilderness 
(ver. 5); but this difficulty is lessened if we suppose the date of the 
Epistle to be nearer 80 than 70. 


CHAPTER III. 


Use of Apocryphal Books by $ude.—Clement of Alexandria in 
his Adumbrationes (Dind. vol. iii. p. 483), after quoting Jude 9, 
“Quando Michael archangelus cum diabolo disputans altercabatur de 
corpore Moysis,” remarks “hic confirmat Assumptionem Moysis,” 1.e., 
here the writer corroborates the Assumption of Moses; and again, in 
commenting on ver. 14, ‘“Prophetavit autem de his septimus ab 
Adam Enoch,” he adds “His verbis prophetam (al. prophetiam) 
comprobat ”’. 

The Hebrew original of the book of Enoch! is now lost. It was 
translated into Greek, of which only a few fragments remain, and 
this was again translated into Ethiopic, probably about 600 a.v. A 
copy of the last was found in Abyssinia in 1773 by Bruce, the famous 
traveller, and an English version was published by Abp. Laurence in 
1821, followed by the Ethiopic text in 1838. The composite nature 
of the book is generally recognised. The latest editor, R. H. Charles, 
who is my authority for what follows, divides it into five sections and 
recognises many interpolations in these. He considers that the larger 
portion of the book was written not later than 160 B.c., and that no 
part is more recent than the Christian era. It exercised an import- 
ant influence on Jewish and Christian literature during the centuries 
which followed being used by the author of the Assumption of 
Moses (written about the Christian era), also by the writers of the 
Book of $ubilees, the Apocalypse of Baruch, the Fourth Book of 
Ezra, and the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs. Mr. Charles 
traces its influence in the N.T. not merely in the epistles of St. Jude 
and the two epistles of St. Peter, but above all, in the Apocalypse ; 
also in the Acts, and the epistle to the Hebrews, in some of the 
epistles of St. Paul, and in the Gospels. It is quoted three times 
(twice as Scripture) in the Epistle of Barnabas, is referred to, though 
not named, in Justin and Athenagoras, is cited by Irenzeus, iv. 16. 2: 
“Enoch. . . cum esset homo, legatione ad angelos fungebatur et trans- 
latus est et conservatur usque nunc testis judicii Dei, quoniam angeli 


1Qn which see Schiirer, Hist. of $ewish People, vol. iii. pp. 54-73. 


INTRODUCTION 235 


quidem deciderunt in terram in judicium” (En. xiv. 7). Tertullian 
quotes it as Scripture, calling Enoch the oldest of the prophets (Jdol. xv., 
A pol. xxii.). He allows that its canonicity was denied by some, “quia 
nec in armarium Judaicum admittitur,” and also because it was thought 
that, if it were a genuine writing of Enoch, it must have perished in 
the Deluge. He considers, however, that it should be received, be- 
cause of its witness to Christ, and because it has the testimony of the 
Apostle Jude. It is twice quoted in Clement’s Ecl. Proph., (Dind. iii. 
pp. 456, 474) as well as in Strom. iii. 9. Origen speaks doubtfully 
of the authority of Enoch: cf. C. Celsum, v. 54, ἐν tats ἐκκλησίαις οὐ 
πάνυ φέρεται ὡς θεῖα τὰ ἐπιγεγραμμένα τοῦ ᾿Ενὼχ βιβλία, and In Fohannem, 
vi. 25, ὡς ἐν τῷ Ἐνὼχ γέγραπται, εἴ τῳ φίλον παραδέχεσθαι ὡς ἅγιον τὸ 
βιβλίον, also In Num. Hom. xxviii. 2, De Ῥγίπο. i. 3.3. Hilary (Comm. 
in Psalm. cxxxii. 3) writes: “Fertur id, de quo etiam nescio cuius 
liber extat, quod angeli concupiscentes filias hominum, cum de caelo 
descenderent, in montem Hermon convenerant’’. Jerome says that 
the doubts entertained as to the epistle of St. Jude arose from his 
quoting an apocryphal book asan authority (De Vir. Ill. iv), “quia de 
libro Enoch, qui apocryphus est, in ea assumit testimonia, a plerisque 
reicitur”. Cf. also Comm. in Ps. cxxxii. 3 and Comm. in Titum, 1. 
12. Augustine (Civ. Dei, xv 23. 4) and Chrysostom (Hom. in Gen. 
vi. 1) speak of the story of the angels and the daughters of men asa 
baseless fable. Still more severe is the condemnation passed on the 
book of Enoch with other apocryphal writings in Const. Apost. vi. 16. 
2, as φθοροποιὰ καὶ τῆς ἀληθείας ἐχθρά. 

Mr. Charles has also edited the Assumption of Moses (1897), 
which he regards as a composite work made up of two distinct books, 
the Testament and the Assumption of Moses.1 “The former was 
written in Hebrew between 7 and 29 a.p., and possibly also the 
latter. A Greek version of the entire work appeared in the first cen- 
tury a.p. Of this only a few fragments have been preserved. The 
Greek version was translated into Latin not later than the fifth cen- 
tury” (pp. xiii, xiv.). ‘The book preserved in the incomplete Latin 
version, first published by Ceriani in 1861, is in reality a Testament 
and not an Assumption.” ‘The editing of the two books in one was 
probably done in the first century, as St. Jude draws upon both in 
his epistle’ (pp. xlvii and 1.). Thus Jude ver. 92 is derived from the 


Cf. Schiirer, pp. 73-83. 

2 See note on this, and add to the illustrative passages there quoted a scholium 
printed for the first time in James’ Test. of Abraham, p. 18: ὁ διάβολος ἀντεῖχεν 
θέλων ἀπατῆσαι, λέγων ὅτι Ἐμόν ἐστιν τὸ σῶμα, ὡς τῆς ὕλης δεσπόζων " καὶ 
ἤκουσεν τὸ Ἐπιτιμήσαι σοι Κύριος, τούτεστιν ὁ Κύριος ὁ πάντων τῶν πνευμάτων 


236 INTRODUCTION 


Assumption, Jude 16 from the Testament (p. Ixii.). On the latter 
Charles compares οὗτοί εἰσι γογγυσταί, μεμψίμοιροι, καὶ τὸ στόμα αὐτῶν 
λαλεῖ ὑπέρογκα, θαυμάζοντες πρόσωπα ὠφελίας χάριν with Ass. M. vii. 7, 
quaerulosi, vii. 9, et manus eorum et mentes immunda tractantes et 
os eorum loquetur ingentia, v. 5, erunt illis temporibus mirantes 
personas. . . et accipientes munera (MS. acceptiones munerum). He 
identifies the ἐμπαῖκται of Jude 18 with the homines pestilentiosi 
of Ass. M. vii. 3, and calls attention to the frequent recurrence of the 
word ἀσεβεῖς in the former (vv. 4, 15, 18) and zmpiz in the latter: see 
vi. 1, facient facientes impietatem, vii. 3, pestilentiosi et impii, 7b. 7, ix. 3, 
xi, 17; 

Again there appears to be a reminiscence of the Testaments of the 
Patriarchs,| where the sin of the Watchers is connected with that of 
Sodom: cf. Test. Nepht. 3, ἥλιος καὶ σελήνη καὶ ἀστέρες οὐκ ἀλλοιοῦσι 
τὴν τάξιν αὐτῶν... ἔθνη πλανηθέντα καὶ ἀφέντα κύριον ἠλλοίωσαν τάξιν 
αὐτῶν... ἐξακολουθήσαντες πνεύμασι πλάνης. Ὑμεῖς μὴ οὕτως... ἵνα 
μὴ γένησθε ὡς Σόδομα, ἥτις ἐνήλλαξεν τάξιν φύσεως αὐτῆς. Ὁμοίως καὶ 
᾿Εγρήγορες ἐνήλλαξαν τάξιν φύσεως αὐτῶν, ols κατηράσατο Κύριος ἐπὶ τοῦ 
κατακλυσμοῦ, Test. Aser 7, μὴ γίνεσθε ὡς Σόδομα ἥτις ἢγνόησε τοὺς ἀγγέλους 
κυρίου καὶ ἀπώλετο ἕως αἰῶνος. There seems to be more than a casual 
coincidence between these passages and Jude 6, 7 and 13, ἀγγέλους 
τοὺς μὴ τηρήσαντας τὴν ἑαυτῶν ἀρχήν. .. ὡς Σόδομα. . . τὸν ὅμοιον 
τρόπον ἐκπορνεύσασαι καὶ ἀπελθοῦσαι ὀπίσω σαρκὸς ἑτέρας πρόκεινται δεῖγμα 
πυρὸς αἰωνίου... ἀστέρες πλανῆται. 

We have seen how this use of apocryphal books was viewed by the 
early Christian writers. They were at first disposed to think that a 
book stamped with the approval of St. Jude must be itself inspired. 
Later on, the feeling changed: the authority of St. Jude was no longer 
sufficient to save the apocryphal writing: on the contrary the prejudice 
against the Apocrypha and its “blasphemous fables” (Chrys. Hom. 
22 in Gen.) led many to doubt the authority of St. Jude: see above 
quotation from Jerome, who argues that the approval of the Apostle 
need not be supposed to extend to the whole of the book of Enoch, 
but only to the verses quoted by him. So Augustine (Civ. Dez, xv. 
23, 4): ‘“Scripsisse quidem nonnulla divina Enoch illum septimum ab 


δεσπόζων - ἄλλοι δέ, ὅτι βουλόμενος ὁ Θεὸς δεῖξαι ὅτι μετὰ τὴν ἔνθενδε ἀπαλλαγήν, 
ταῖς ἡμετέραις ψυχαῖς ἀνθιστάμενοι «ἦσαν» δαίμονες πορευομέναις τὴν ἐπὶ τὰ 
ἄνω πορείαν, τοῦτο οὖν συνεχώρησεν ὁρᾶσθαι ἐπὶ τῆς Μωσέως ταφῆς  ἐβλασφήμει 
γὰρ καὶ ὁ διάβολος κατὰ Μωσέως, φονέα τοῦτον καλῶν διὰ τὸ πατάξαι τὸν Αἰγύπ- 
τιον" ὁ Μιχαὴλ ὁ ἀρχάγγελος, μὴ ἐνεγκὼν τὴν αὐτοῦ βλασφημίαν, εἴρηκεν αὐτῷ 
ὅτι Ἐπιτιμήσαι σοι Κύριος ὁ Θεός, διάβολε. ἔλεγε δὲ καὶ τοῦτο, ὅτι ἐψεύσατο ὁ Θεὸς 
εἰσαγαγὼν τὸν Μωσῆν ἔνθα ὥμοσεν αὐτὸν μὴ εἰσελθεῖν. 
τ Αη edition has lately been brought out by Charles. 


INTRODUCTION 237 


Adam negare non possumus, cum hoc in epistola canonica Judas 
apostolus dicat” (although the book as a whole has been justly 
excluded from the Canon). 

Some modern writers have endeavoured to avoid the necessity of 
allowing that an apocryphal writing is quoted as authoritative in the 
Bible, by the supposition that the words quoted may have come down 
by tradition and have been made use of by the inspired writer, in- 
dependently of the book from which he is supposed to quote, or that 
they were uttered by immediate inspiration without any human as- 
sistance, or again, that the book of Enoch may be subsequent to that 
of Jude, and have borrowed from it. But the careful investigation of 
many scholars, as summed up by Charles, can leave little doubt in any 
candid mind as to the proximate dates, both of Enoch and of the 
Assumption. St. Jude does not put forward his account of the burial 
of Moses or the preaching of Enoch, as though it were something 
unheard of before. As regards the libertines described in the latter 
book, he uses the phrase mpoyeypappevor, implying that he refers to a 
written prophecy. None of the early Fathers find a difficulty in 
supposing him to refer to a book which was not included in the Canon. 
Jews of that time were accustomed to accept rabbinical explanations 
or additions to Scripture as having authority. Thus St. Paul accepts 
the story of the Rock which followed the Israelites in their wanderings 
(1 Cor. x. 4), gives the names of the magicians who withstood Moses 
before Pharaoh (2 Tim. iii. 8), recognises the instrumentality of angels 
in the giving of the Law (Gal. ili. 19, cf. Heb. 11. 2, Acts vii. 53). So, 
too, Stephen speaks of Moses as learned in all the wisdom of the 
Egyptians (Acts vii. 2); the author of the epistle to the Hebrews (xi. 
37) alludes to the tradition as to the death of Isaiah (see Charles’ 
Ascension of Isaiah, pp. xlv. foll.), and James (v. 17) limits the drought 
predicted by Elijah to 34 years. 


CHAPTER IV. 


The Story of the Fallen Angels.—St. Jude (vv. 5-8) introduces as 
examples of the divine wrath against those who had sinned after 
receiving favours from God (1) the Israelites who perished in the 
wilderness for unbelief after they had been saved from Egypt; (2) the 
angels who abandoned their original office and habitation, being led. 
away by fleshy lusts, and are now kept in chains under darkness till 
the day of judgment; (3) the people of Sodom, who inhabited a land. 
like the garden of the Lord (Gen. xiii. 10), who were rescued from 
Chedorlaomer by Abraham (Gen. xiv. 16, 17), and yet sinned after the 
fashion of the angels, and are now a warning to all, suffering the 
punishment of eternal fire. A similar account is given in 2 Pet. 11.4-9 
where it is said (1) that God spared not the angels who sinned, but. 
hurled them into Tartarus, to be detained there in chains (or pits) of 
darkness until the final judgment; (2) that He brought a flood on the 
world of the ungodly, while he spared Noah; (3) that He destroyed. 
Sodom and Gomorrah, while he delivered righteous Lot; in all three 
cases punishing impurity and rebellion. 

As is shown in the explanatory notes, this account of the Fall of. 
the Angels is taken directly from the book of Enoch, which is itself an 
expansion from Jewish and Gentile sources of the strange narrative 
contained in Gen. vi. 1-4: “It came to pass, when men began to: 
multiply on the face of the ground and daughters were born unto them, 
that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair ; 
and they took them wives of all that they chose. . . . The Nephilim 
were in the earth in those days, and also after that, when the sons of 
God came in to the daughters of men, and they bare children unto. 
them : the same were the mighty men which were of old, the men of 
renown” (R.V.). ἐγένετο ἡνίκα ἤρξαντο οἱ ἄνθρωποι πολλοὶ γίνεσθαι ἐπὶ 
τῆς γῆς καὶ θυγατέρες ἐγεννήθησαν αὐτοῖς, ἰδόντες δὲ οἱ ἄγγελοι τοῦ Θεοῦ 
τὰς θυγατέρας τῶν ἀνθρώπων ὅτι καλαὶ εἰσὶν ἔλαβον ἑαυτοῖς γυναῖκας ἀπὸ. 
πασῶν ὧν ἐξελέξαντο. . . οἱ δὲ γίγαντες ἦσαν ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις. 
ἐκείναις, καὶ μετ᾽ ἐκεῖνο, ὡς ἂν εἰσεπορεύοντο οἱ υἱοὶ τοῦ Θεοῦ πρὸς τὰς. 
θυγατέρας τῶν ἀνθρώπων καὶ ἐγέννωσαν ἑαυτοῖς, ἐκεῖνοι ἦσαν οἱ γίγαντες οἱ. 
ἀπ᾽ αἰῶνος, οἱ ἄνθρωποι οἱ ὀνομαστοί (LXX). That the version ἄγγελοι. 


INTRODUCTION 239 


gives the true force of the original is evident from the other passages 
in which the phrase “sons of God” occurs, Job i. 6, ii. 1, xxviii. 7, 
Dan. iii. 25, 28, Ps. xxix. 1, Ixxxix. 6. It has been suggested that the 
phrase per’ ἐκεῖνο may be a marginal note having reference to Num. 
xiii. 33, where the Nephilim are mentioned as a gigantic race, “in 
whose eyes the spies were as grasshoppers,” inhabiting a part of 
Canaan at the time of the Exodus. The translation γίγαντες implies 
not only superhuman size, but also superhuman insolence and impiety. 
According to Greek mythology they were children of Heaven and 
Earth, who rose up in insurrection against the Gods and were hurled 
down to Tartarus or buried beneath the mountains. This resemblance 
is noted by Josephus in the passage quoted below. 

It is evident that the passage in Gen. vi. is a fragment unconnected 
either with what precedes or follows. Driver says of it: ‘‘ We must 
see in it an ancient Hebrew legend . . . the intention of which was 
to account for the origin of a supposed race of prehistoric giants, of 
whom no doubt (for they were ‘men of name’) Hebrew folk-lore 
told much more than the compiler of Genesis has deemed worthy 
of preservation”. Ryle (Early Narratives of Genesis, pp. 91-95) 
speaks of it as “δὴ extract from a very early legend which gives an 
alternative explanation of the Fall, in which woman is again tempted 
by one of higher race”’. 

The story was variously commented on by later Jewish writers, 
most of whom supposed that the Nephilim were the offspring of the 
intercourse between the angels and the daughters of men, and that 
they were destroyed in the Flood. 

_ The Fall of the Angels is largely treated of in the collection of 
treatises which goes under the name of the Book of Enoch. The 
‘earliest portion of the book is considered by the latest editor, Mr. 
R. H. Charles, to have been written in the first quarter of the second 
century B.c. Two hundred of the angels, or watchers, ‘Eypyyopo as 
they are called in the Greek versions of Dan. iv. 13 by Aquila and 
Symmachus, conspired together under the leadership of Semjaza (else- 
where called Azazel, as in Enoch, chapters viii. and ix.) and descended 
on Mount Hermon in the days of Jared, father of Enoch (vi.). There 
they took to themselves human wives whom they instructed in magic 
and various arts, and begot giants, who afterwards begot the Nephilim : 
of. Viii., of δὲ γίγαντες ἐτέκνωσαν Ναφηλείμ . . . μετὰ δὲ ταῦτα ἤρξαντο 
οἱ γίγαντες κατεσθίειν τὰς σάρκας τὰς ἀνθρώπων (like Polyphemus). Com- 
plaint having been made of the sin and misery thus introduced into 
the world, Raphael is sent down from heaven to bind Azazel hand 
and foot and shut him up in darkness till the judgment day, when he 


240 INTRODUCTION 


will be cast into eternal fire. Gabriel is at the same time sent to 
slay the giants (x. 9): the watchers will be bound under the hills 
for seventy generations, and then be confined for ever in the abyss 
of fire : the spirits of the slain giants become demons. In chap. xix., 
however, the demons are represented as existing before the fall of the 
watchers. 

The prevailing demonology of the Book of Enoch is thus summed 
up by Dr. Charles (Enoch, p. 52). The angelic watchers who fell 
from lusting after the daughters of men have been imprisoned in 
darkness from the time of their fall. The demons are the spirits 
which proceeded from the souls of the giants who were their offspring. 
They work moral ruin on earth without hindrance till the final judg- 
ment. Satan is the ruler of a counter kingdom of evil. He led 
astray the angels and made them his subjects. He also tempted 
Eve. The Satans can still appear in heaven (as in Job). They tempt 
to evil, they accuse the fallen, they punish the condemned. Ir 
portions however of the Book of Enoch there is no mention of « 
Satan or Satans, but the angels are led astray by their own chief 
Azazel, or as he is sometimes called Semjaza (En. ix., x., xiii., liv.). Of 
the Secrets of Enoch, which is supposed to date from about the 
Christian era, Dr. Charles says:! “It is hard to get a consistent view 
of the demonology of the book; it seems to be as follows: Satan, one 
of the archangels, seduced the watchers of the fifth heaven into revolt 
in order to establish a counter kingdom to God. Therefore Satan 
or the Satans were cast down from.heaven and given the air for 
their habitation. Some however of the Satans or Watchers went 
down to earth and married the daughters of men.’ Compare 
xviii. 3, ““These are the Grigori, who with their prince Satanail re- 
jected the holy Lord, and in consequence of these things they are 
kept in great darkness”. 

In chap. liv. there appears to be an attempt to connect the two 
different stories of the Fall: the guilt of the Watchers is said to 
have consisted in their becoming subject to Satan, who was either 
identified with the Serpent, as in Apoc. xii. 9, καὶ ἐβλήθη ὁ δράκων ὁ 
μέγας, ὁ ὄφις ὁ ἀρχαῖος, ὁ καλούμενος Διάβολος καὶ ὁ Σατανᾶς, ὁ πλανῶν τὴν 
οἰκουμένην ὅλην---ἐβλήθη εἰς τὴν γῆν, καὶ οἱ ἄγγελοι αὐτοῦ μετ᾽ αὐτοῦ 
ἐβλήθησαν ; or else was supposed to have made use of the Serpent 
as his instrument, as in the Assumption of Moses quoted by Orig. 
De Princip. iii. 2. 1 (Lomm. vol. xxi. p. 303): “In Genesi serpens 
Evam seduxisse describitur, de quo in Asc. Mosis (cujus libelli meminit 
-apostolus Judas) Michael Archangelus cum diabolo disputans de cor- 


1 See his note on pp. 36, 37. 


INTRODUCTION 24% 


pore Mosis ait a diabolo inspiratum serpentem causam exstitisse 
praevaricationis Adae et Evae”.} 

The history of the gradual development of the belief in regard 
to Satan, as exhibited in the Bible, will be found in any of the 
Dictionaries of the Bible. Beside the attempt to harmonise the 
two Fall-stories by making Satan the cause of both, an attempt was 
made to arrive at the same result by ascribing to Satan or the 
Serpent the same motive which led to the fall of the angels. In 
Wisdom ii. 24 we read “ By the envy of the devil death entered into 
the world”. This envy is explained in rabbinical writings sometimes 
as occasioned by the dignity of Adam and his lordship over the 
creation, but more frequently by Satan’s desire for Eve:? cf. 4 Macc. 
xviii. 8, οὐδὲ ἐλυμήνατό pou τὰ ἁγνὰ τῆς παρθενίας λυμεὼν ἀπάτης ὄφις. 
Sometimes again his fall is ascribed to the less ignoble motive of 
pride, as in the pseudepigraphic Life of Adam: ‘“‘ When God created 
Adam, He called upon the angels to adore him as His image... . 
Satan however refused, and on being threatened with the wrath of 
God said that he would exalt his throne above the stars of heaven” 
(Isa. xiv. 13). In other writings (Life of Adam, Secrets of Enoch) 
Satan refuses to worship God Himself, “entertaining the impossible 
idea that he should make his throne higher than the clouds over 
the earth, and should be equal in rank to [God’s] power’. 

There can be little doubt that the story of the punishment of 
the angels took its colouring from two passages of Isaiah, the fine 
imaginative description of the mighty king of Babylon, under the 
figure of the morning star, entering the realm of Hades (ch. xiv.) 
and what appears to be an account of the punishment of guardian 
angels for their neglect of the nations committed to their charge 
(ch. xxiv. 21 f.), “It shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord 
shall punish the host of the high ones on high, and the kings of 
the earth upon the earth. And they shall be gathered together as 
prisoners are gathered in the pit, and shall be shut up in the prison 
and after many days shall they be visited.” 

St. Jude’s allusion to this story is merely parenthetical, to illus- 
trate the law of judgment. He appears not to recognise any con- 


‘Cf. Tennant, The Fall and Original Sin, pp. 245, 246. 

2See Tennant, pp. 152 foll.; Thackeray, St. Paul and Fewish Thought, pp. 50 
foll.; Edersheim, Life and Times of Fesus, i. p. 165, ii. 753 foll. In the latter 
passage the rabbis are quoted to the effect that the angels generally were opposed 
to the creation of man, and that the demons were the offspring of Eve and male. 
spirits, and Adam and female spirits, especially Lilith. 

3See Tennant, pp. 199, 201, 206. 


242 INTRODUCTION 


nection between the Fallen Angels and Satan. The former are 
suffering imprisonment in darkness till the final judgment: the latter 
was apparently able to confront the archangel on equal terms, when 
contending for the body of Moses. So the continued activity and 
even the authority of Satan and his angels in this world are asserted 
both in the O.T., as in Job i. 6 and Zech. iii. 1, 2, and in the N.T. 
as in James iv. 7, 1 P. v. 8, Eph. 6, 11, 12 (we have to stand against 
the wiles of the devil, . . . our warfare is not against flesh and blood, 
but) πρὸς τὰς ἀρχάς, πρὸς τὰς ἐξουσίας, πρὸς τοὺς κοσμοκράτορας τοῦ 
σκότους τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου, πρὸς τὰ πνευματικὰ τῆς πονηρίας ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρα- 
νίοις, See Lightfoot on Col. ii. 15. In 2 Cor. iv. 4 Satan is spoken 
of as the god, in John xii. 31 and xvi. 11 as the prince of this world. 
He is the tempter and accuser of the brethren, and did not shrink 
even from assailing the Son of God Himself (Mt. iv. 3). 

The above account of the Fall of the Angels was that usually ac- 
cepted, with slight variations, both among Jews and Christians till 
towards the close of the fourth century A.D. 

Julius Africanus is said to be the only one of the ante-Nicene 
Fathers who enunciated the view which afterwards prevailed, v7z., 
that ‘‘the sons of God were the descendants of Seth, and the daughters 
of men descendants of Cain’’.! See the quotation in Routh, Rel. Sacr. 
ii. p. 241, where he also gives the alternative explanation εἰ δὲ ἐπ᾿ ἀγγέλων 
VOOLTO τοῦτο, τοὺς περὶ μαγείας καὶ γοητείας . . . ἐσχολακότας συνιέναι χρὴ 
τῶν μετεώρων ταῖς γυναιξὶ τὴν γνῶσιν δεδωκέναι. Eusebius (Pr. Ev. ν. 4, 
11, 12) still keeps to the old view and compares the narrative of Gen. 
6 to the stories of the Titans and Giants of Greek mythology. So 
Lactantius, Div. Inst. ii. 14: ‘Deus ne fraudibus suis diabolus, cui 
ab initio terrae dederat potestatem, vel corrumperet vel disperderet 
homines, quod in exordio rerum fecerat, misit angelos ad tutelam 
cultumque generis humani.. . Itaque illos cum hominibus com- 
morantes dominator ille terrae fallacissimus consuetudine ipsa paul- 
latim ad vitia pellexit et mulierum congressibus inquinavit . . . sic eos 
diabolus ex angelis Dei suos fecit satellites,” etc. So Sulpicius Severus 
(Chron. i. 2): “‘ Angeli quibus caelum sedes erat, speciosarum forma 
virginum capti ... naturae suae originisque degeneres . . . matri- 
moniis se mortalibus miscuerunt.” Julian, like Celsus, used this belief 
as a ground for attacking Christianity. Cyril of Alexandria, in his 
reply (ix. p. 296) repudiates the belief as altogether unworthy, and 
injurious to morality, since men plead the angels’ sin as excuse for 
their own, and adopts the interpretation of ‘‘ sons of God”’ previously 


It is also found in the apocryphal Conflict of Adam and Eve of uncertain date, 
-on which see the art. ‘‘ Adam, Books of,” in the D. of Christ. Biog. i. 36 foll. 


INTRODUCTION 243 


given by Africanus. Chrysostom deals at length with the subject in 
his 22nd homily on Genesis. He calls the old interpretation blas- 
phemous, and holds that it is precluded by the words of Christ, that 
“in the resurrection men shall be like angels, neither marrying nor 
given in marriage”. Augustine (Civ. Dez, xv. 23) thinks it cannot be 
-denied “ Silvanos et Faunos, quos vulgo incubos vocant . . . mulierum 
appetisse ac peregisse concubitum. . . . Dei tamen angelos sanctos 
nullo modo sic labi potuisse crediderim, nec de his dixisse Apostolum 
Petrum .. . sed potius de illis qui primum apostatantes a Deo cum 
diabolo principe suo ceciderunt,” unless we are rather to understand 
this of the children of Seth. A little later Philastrius (Haer. 107) goes 
‘so far as to condemn the old opinion as a heresy. 

The sympathies of Christians in the present day must assuredly be 
‘with those who endeavoured to eliminate from the Scriptures all that 
might seem to be dishonouring to God and injurious to men. But the 
methods employed with this view were often such as we could not now 
accept. For instance, the allegorical method borrowed from the Stoics 
by Philo, and adopted from him by many of the Fathers, is too sub- 
jective and arbitrary to be of any value in getting rid of moral diffi- 
culties. We have replaced this now by the historical method, first 
enunciated by our Lord, when he contrasted the spirit of the Gospel 
with that of the old Dispensation.!. There is a continuous growth in 
the ideal of conduct as set before us in the Bible. Much that was 
commanded or permitted in the days of Abraham or Moses or David 
is forbidden to those who have received the fuller light of Christianity. 
So, what it was found possible for men to believe about God Himself 
and about the holy angels, is impossible for us now. The words put 
into the mouth of God in Gen. iii. 22, and in xi. 6, 7, we feel to be in- 
consistent with any true idea of the power and wisdom and love of 
‘God, and only suitable to a very low state of human development. So 
also for the story of the fall of the angels. But is it a satisfactory 
explanation of the latter to suppose that ‘sons of Seth” are meant 
by ‘‘sons of God”’? Ryle (Early Narratives of Genesis, 91-95) points 
out that “‘ there is nothing in the context to suggest this, no sign that 
the Sethites were distinguished for piety : they are not even exempted 
from the charge of general wickedness which brought on the Flood””. 
Equally untenable is the Jewish explanation that ‘‘ sons of God” are 
‘the nobles. I think no one who has studied with any care the recent 

- investigations as to the origin of the book of Genesis, of which Driver’s 
Book of Genesis may be taken as a specimen, can doubt that it con- 
tains much which is unhistoric, though full of moral and spiritual 

1Cf. Matt. v. 21-48, xix. 8; Luke ix. 54-56. 


244 INTRODUCTION 


teaching. The pre-Abrahamic narrative shows many resemblances 
to the Babylonian records, but in general the motive has been 
changed and purified.'| Thus Driver says (p. Ixiii.): ‘‘It is impossible, 
if we compare the early narratives of Genesis with the Babylonian 
narratives, from which in some cases they seem plainly to have been 
ultimately derived . . . not to perceive the controlling operation of 
the Spirit of God, which has taught these Hebrew writers . . . to take 
the primitive traditions of the human race, to purify them from their 
grossness and their polytheism, and to make them at once the founda- 
tion and the explanation of the long history that is to follow.” Of 
the particular passage in question, however, Driver says (p. 83): “ As 
a rule, the Hebrew narrators stripped off the mythological colouring 
of the piece of folklore which they record; but in the present instance 
it is still discernible ’’.? 


1 Tennant, 20, 21, 41. 

3 For further information on this subject see Suicer’s Thesaurus under ἄγγελος, 
and *Eyprjyopos, Hasting’s ἢ. of B. under “‘ Angel,” “‘ Demon,” “ Fall,” “‘ Flood ”’; 
Encycl. of B. Lit. under “ Angel,’ “Demon,” “ Deluge,” ‘“‘ Nephilim,”’ “ Satan”; 
Maitland’s Eruvin (Essays iv.-vi.), where the literal interpretation is defended; 
Hagenbach, Hist. Doctr. § 52 and § 132. 


CHAPTER V. 


Notes on the Text of the Epistle of fude.—The Epistle of Jude is 


contained in the uncials NABCKLP. It is omitted in the Peshitto, 
but included in the later Syriac versions,! the Philoxenian and Hark- 
leian, here distinguished as syv? and syr*. In citing the Egyptian 
versions 1 have used the notation Boh., now commonly employed, 
instead of the less distinctive Copi., employed by Tischendorf. The 
only other point which it may be well to mention is that, as in the 
Epistle of James, the symbol + is appended in the Critical Notes to 
signify that the reading in question is found in other authorities 
besides those previously mentioned. In discussing the readings I 
start with that of WH. 

If we may judge from the number of “ primitive errors” suspected 
by WH in the short Epistle of Jude, it would seem that the text is 
in a less satisfactory condition than that of any other portion of the 
New Testament. There are no less than four such errors in these 
twenty-five verses, the same number as are found in the eight 
chapters of the two Petrine Epistles, and in the forty-four chapters of 
the first two Gospels. I notice below some passages where the text 
presents special difficulties. 

Ver. 5. ὑπομνῆσαι δὲ ὕμᾶς βούλομαι, εἰδότας ἅπαξ πάντα, ὅτι Κύριος 
λαὸν ἐκ γῆς Αἰγύπτου σώσας τὸ δεύτερον τοὺς μὴ πιστεύσαντας ἀπώλεσεν. 
I quote Tregelles’ notes with additions from Tischendorf in round 
brackets, only changing the notation of the Egyptian and Syriac 
versions to prevent confusion, and correcting the citations in ac- 
cordance with more recent collations. 


εἰδότας add. “ὑμᾶς Μ ΚΙ, 31 sytt., om. ABC? 13 Vulg. Boh. Sah. Arm.,’’ and 
so Tisch. 


In point of fact however B reads εἰδότας ὑμᾶς, as any one may 
convince himself by looking at Cozza-Luzi’s photographic reproduc- 
tion. Also Dr. Gwynn reports that ἢ and all the MSS. of 2 give 
the same reading, though he adds that the pleonastic idiom of the 
Syriac would lead the translators to supply the pronoun even if 
wanting in the Greek. The preponderance of authority is therefore 

1See Dr. Gwynn’s Lat» Syriac Versions, published in 1909, 
VOL. V. 16 


246 INTRODUCTION 


in favour of this latter reading. The repeated ὑμᾶς emphasises the 
contrast between the readers (“to remind you, you who know it 
already”) and the libertines previously spoken of. The repetition 
here may be compared with the repeated ὑμῖν of v. 3. 


ἅπαξ ante πάντα ABCL. 13. 31. Vulg. Ante ὅτι K. Ante λαὸν. (Syrr.) Arm. 
Ante ἐκ γῆς Aiy. Clem. 280 (and 997) Did. Cassiod. ὅτι κύριος σώσας τὸν λαὸν 
ἐκ γῆς Aiy. ἅπαξ Sah., ὅτι ἅπαξ κύριος σώσας λαὸν αὐτοῦ Boh. Om. ἅπαϑ Lucif. 
28. [ἅπαξ is so placed in Syrr. as to be connected with σώσας “when he had once 
saved them,” G.] 


παντα ABCN 13 Vulg. Syrh. Boh. Arm. Aeth. Lucif. [In the Afp. to 
WH (Sel. Readings, p. 106) it is suggested that this may be a primitive error for 
πάντας (cf. τ John ii. 20) found in Syr 1], τοῦτο 31 KL. Sah. 

ὅτι] add. ὃ C.2 KL. 31. Arm. Clem. 280. Om. ABN 13. 


κύριος] SNCKL. Syrh. Θεὸς Ο.3 Tol. SyrP Arm. Clem. Lucif. Ἰησοῦς 
AB 13 Vulg. Boh. Sah. Aeth. [In App. to WH. (Sel. Readings, p. 106) it is 
suggested that there may have been some primitive error, ‘‘apparently OTIKC 
(ὅτι Κύριος), and OTIIC (ὅτι᾽ Ιησους) for OTIO (ὅτι ὃ) ”.] 

γῆς] om. Syr?. 


It appears to me that the true reading of the passage is ὑπομνῆσαι 
δὲ ὑμᾶς βούλομαι, εἰδότας ὑμᾶς πάντα, ὅτι Κύριος ἅπαξ λαὸν ἐκ γῆς Αἰγύπτου 
σώσας τὸ δεύτερον [τοὺς] μὴ πιστεύσαντας ἀπώλεσεν. I see no difficulty 
in πάντα, which gives a reason for the use of the word ὑπομνῆσαι, “I 
need only remind you, because you already know all that I have 
to say”. It was easy for the second ὑμᾶς to be omitted as un- 
necessary, and then the word ἅπαξ might be inserted in its place 
partly for rhythmical reasons; but it is really unmeaning after εἰδότας : 
the knowledge of the incidents, which are related in this and the 
following verses, is not a knowledge for good and all, such as the 
faith spoken of in ver. 3. On the other hand, ἅπαξ is very appropriate 
if taken with λαὸν σώσας (a people was saved out of Egypt once for 
all), and it prepares the way for τὸ δεύτερον. For the reading πάντας 
I see no reason. Can it be assumed that all who are addressed 
should be familiar with the legends contained in the Book of Enoch 
and the Assumgtion of Moses, to which allusion is made in what fol- 
lows? It is surely much more to the point for the writer to say, 
as he does again below (ver. 17), that he is only repeating what is 
generally known, though it need not be known to every individual. 
As to Hort’s suggestion on the word κύριος, that the original was 
ὅτι ὃ (λαὸν σώσας), I think the fact of the variants is better explained 
by Spitta, who considers that the abbreviations I€, KC, ΘΕ might 
easily be confused, if the first letter was faintly written, and that 


1“ This is an error: the two best MSS. of 2 represent πάντα." ἃ. 


INTRODUCTION 24) 


the mention of τὸν μόνον δεσπότην καὶ Κύριον “I. Χ. in the preceding 
verse would naturally lead a later copyist to prefer iC, a supposition 
which is confirmed by Cramer’s Catena, Ὁ. 158, εἴρηται yap mpd τούτων 
περὶ αὐτοῦ, ὡς εἴη ἀληθινὸς θεὸς οὗτος ὁ μόνος δεσπότης ὁ κύριος ‘I. X., ὁ 
ἀναγαγὼν τὸν λαὸν ἐξ Αἰγύπτου διὰ Μωσέως. Spitta himself however 
holds that ΘΕ is the true reading, as it agrees with the corresponding 
passage in 2 Peter ii. 4, ὁ Θεὸς ἀγγέλων ἁμαρτησάντων οὐκ ἐφείσατο, 
and with Clement’s paraphrase (Adumbr. Dind. iii. p. 482) : “ Quoniam 
Dominus Deus semel populum de terra Aegypti liberans deinceps 
eos qui non crediderunt perdidit”. There is no instance in the New 
Testament of the personal name “Jesus” being used of the pre- 
existent Messiah, though the official name “Christ” is found in 1 
Cor. x. 4, 9, in reference to the wandering in the wilderness. But 
in the second and later centuries this distinction was less carefully 
observed. Thus Justin M. (Dial. 120), speaking of the prophecy 
in Genesis xlix. 10, says that it does not refer to Judah, but to Jesus, 
τὸν καὶ τοὺς πατέρας ὑμῶν ἐξ Αἰγύπτου ἐξαγαγόντα, and this use of the 
name was confirmed by the idea that the son of Nun was a per- 
sonification of Christ (see Justin, Dial. 75; Clem. Al. 183; Didymus, 
De Trin. 1. 19, Ἰούδας καθολικῶς γράφει, ἅπαξ yap κύριος Ἰησοῦς λαὸν ἐξ 
Αἰγύπτου σώσας κ.ιτιλ.; Jérome, C. Fov. 1. 12; Lact. Inst. 4. 17, 
“Christi figuram gerebat ille Jesus, qui cum primum Auses vocaretur, 
Moyses futura praesentiens jussit eum Jesum vocari’’). In the ex- 
planatory note I have stated my reasons for considering that the 
article before μή did not belong to the original text. 

Ver. 12. οὗτοί εἶσιν [οἱ] ἐν ταῖς ἀγάπαις ὑμῶν σπιλάδες συνευωχούμενοι 
ἀφόβως ἑαυτοὺς ποιμαίνοντες. The article here is omitted by WK and 
many inferior MSS. with vg. (but not syrr. or sah. or boh.), and some 
of the patristic quotations. I agree with Dr. Chase in thinking that 
it is out of place here, as in ver. 5 above. There is not only the 
difficulty of construction (ot . . . omAdBes), but the very bold assump- 
tion that the signification of σπιλάδες will be at once apparent. If we 
omit the article, ἀφόβως should be attached to συνευωχ. as by Ti. In 
syrr. it is joined with ποιμαίνοντες. 

Ver. 19. οὗτοί εἰσιν οἱ ἀποδιορίζοντες, ψυχικοὶ πνεῦμα μὴ ἔχοντες. 


ἀποδιορίζοντες add. ἑαυτούς C vulg. syrr. Om, SABKL 13, etc. 


Schott, B. Weiss, and Huther-Kiihl suppose the words ψυχικοὶ 
πνεῦμα μὴ ἔχοντες to be spoken by, or at least to express the feeling of 
οἱ ἀποδιορίζοντες : “welche Unterscheidungen machen, sc. zwischen 
Psychikern und Pneumatikern, wobei dann der Verfasser diese Un- 
terscheidungen in seiner drastischen Weise sofort zu ihren Ungunsten 


248 INTRODUCTION 


umkehrt”. This explanation seems to me to give a better sense than 
the gloss approved by Spitta, ot τὰ σχίσματα ποιοῦντες ; for one cause 
of the danger which threatens the Church is that the innovators do 
not separate themselves openly, but steal in unobserved (παρεισεδύῃσαν, 
ver. 4), and take part in the love-feasts of the faithful, in which they 
are like sunken rocks (ver. 12); and, secondly, it is by no means cer- 
tain that the word ἀποδιορίζω could bear this sense. ἀφορίζω is used 
in Luke vi. 22 of excommunication by superior authority, which of 
course would not be applicable here. On the other hand, it seems 
impossible to get the former sense out of the Greek as it stands. 
Even if we allowed the possibility of such a harsh construction as to 
put ψυχικοί in inverted commas, as the utterance of the innovators 
(and should we not then have expected the contrast ψυχικοί, mveupa- 
τικοί ἢ), still we cannot use the same word over again to express Jude’s 
“drastic”? retort. This difficulty would be removed if we supposed 
the loss of a line to the following effect after ἀποδιορίζοντες :-— 


υχικοὺς ὑμᾶς (Or τοὺς πιστοὺς) λέγοντες, ὄντες αὐτοὶ 
Χ S Up Y ? 


ψυχικοὶ πνεῦμα μὴ ἔχοντες. 


The opposition of ψυχικοί to πνευματικοί is familiar in the writings 
of Tertullian after he became a Montanist. The Church is carnal, 
the sect spiritual. So the Valentinians distinguished their own ad- 
herents as pneumatici from the psychict who composed the Church. 
These were also technical terms with the Naassenes and Heracleon 
(see my notes on James iii. 15), and were probably borrowed by the 
early heretics from St. Paul, who uses them to distinguish the natural 
from the heavenly body (1 Cor. xv. 44), and also to express the pre- 
sence or absence of spiritual insight (1 Cor. ii. 14 f.) ψυχικὸς ἄνθρωπος 
οὐ δέχεται τὰ τοῦ πνεύματος τοῦ Θεοῦ, μωρία yap αὐτῷ ἐστιν... 6 δὲ 
πνευματικὸς ἀνακρίνει πάντα. The innovators against whom St. Jude 
writes seem to have been professed followers of St. Paul (like the 
Marcionites afterwards), abusing the doctrine of Free Grace which 
they had learnt from him (ver. 4 τὴν τοῦ Θεοῦ χάριτα μετατιθέντες εἰς 
ἀσέλγειαν), professing a knowledge of the βάθη τοῦ Θεοῦ (1 Cor. ii. 10), 
though it was really a knowledge oniy of τὰ βάθεα τοῦ Σατανᾶ (Apoc. ii. 
24), and claiming to be the true δυνατοί and πνευματικοί, as denying 
dead works and setting the spirit above the letter. This explains the 
subsequent misrepresentation of St. Paul as a heresiarch in the 
Pseudo-Clementine writings. 

Vv. 22, 23. (Text of Tischendorf and Tregelles) καὶ ots μὲν ἐλέγχετε 
διακρινομένους, ols δὲ σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες, ols δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ, 
μισοῦντες καὶ τὸν ἀπὸ τῆς σαρκὸς ἐσπιλωμένον χιτῶνα. (Text of WH. and 


INTRODUCTION 249 


B. Weiss) καὶ οὖς μὲν ἐλεᾶτε διακρινομένους σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες, 
οὗς δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ μισοῦντες καὶ τὸν ἀπὸ τῆς σαρκὸς ἐσπιλωμένον χιτῶνα. 
In App. to WH. it is added, “Some primitive error probable: perhaps 
the first ἐλεᾶτε an interpolation” (Sel. Readings, Ὁ. 107). 


22 ἐλέγχετε AC 13. Vulg. Boh. Arm. Aeth. (Eph. Theophy]l. Oec. Comm. Cassiod.). 
ἐλεᾶτε SYBC? Syrh. ἐλεεῖτε KLP (Theophyl. Oec. ἐχέ.), ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζετε 
(hic) Syrp. Clem. 773. 


διακρινομένους ABCN. 13. Vulg. Syrr. Boh. Arm. Clem. 773, διακρινόμενοι 
KLP +. 


23. ovs δὲ (1st) NACKLP 13 Vulg. Syrh. Boh. Arm. Om. B., δὲ Syrp. Clem 
oolere SABC 13 Vulg. Boh. Arm. Aeth., ἐν φόβῳ σώζετε KLP +, ἐλεεῖτε 


Clem. 773 (quoted below), ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ Syrp. ἐκ πυρὸς NABCKLP 
13 Arm., ἐκ τοῦ 7. Boh. Om. σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες SyrP. 


ἁρπάζοντες ots δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ ABN 13. Vulg., Arm., om. ἁρπάζοντες Boh., 
ἁρπάζοντες ἐν φόβῳ C. Syrh, ἁρπάζοντες KLP +. 


Tischendorf makes the matter clearer by giving the consecutive text 
of versions and quotations as follows: Vulg. Et hos quidem arguite 
judicatos, illos vero salvate de igne rapientes, aliis autem miseremini 
in timore. Αὐτὸ. Et quosdam corripite super peccatis eorum, et quor- 
undam miseremini cum fuerint victi, et quosdam salvate ex igne et 
liberate eos. Ar?. Et signate quosdam cum dubitaverint orbos (?) et 
salvate quosdam territione, abripite eos ex igne. Aeth. quoniam est 
quem redarguent per verbum quod dictum est (Aeth®”. propter pecca- 
tum eorum), et est qui et servabitur ex igne et rapient eum, et est qui 
servabitur timore et poenitentia. Arm. Et quosdam damnantes sitis 
reprehensione, et quosdam salvate rapiendo ex igne, et quorundam 
miseremini timore judicando (? indicando). Cassiodor. 142 Ita ut 
quosdam dijudicatos arguant, quosdam de adustione aeterni ignis 
eripiant, nonnullis misereantur errantibus et conscientias maculatas 
emundent, sic tamen ut peccata eorum digna execratione refugiant. 
Mr. Horner states that vv. 22, 23 are omitted in Sah. He translates 
Boh. as follows: καὶ ots μὲν ἐλέγχετε διακρινομένους, ols δὲ σώζετε ἐκ τοῦ 
πυρός (al. om. τοῦ), ots δὲ ἐλεᾶτε (al. φέρετε) ἐν φόβῳ. Commentaries of 
Theophylact and Oecumenius, κἀκείνους δέ, εἰ μὲν ἀποδιΐστανται ὑμῶν---- 
τοῦτο γὰρ σημαίνει τὸ διακρίνεσθαι---ἐλέγχετε, τουτέστι φανεροῦτε τοῖς πᾶσι 
τὴν ἀσέβειαν αὐτῶν - εἴτε δὲ πρὸς ἴασιν ἀφορῶσι, μὴ ἀπωθεῖσθε, ἀλλὰ τῷ τῆς 
ἀγάπης ὑμῶν ἐλέῳ προσλαμβάνεσθε, σώζοντες ἐκ τοῦ ἠπειλημένου αὐτοῖς 
πυρός - προσλαμβάνεσθε δὲ μετὰ τοῦ ἐλεεῖν αὐτοὺς καὶ μετὰ φόβου. 

In all these it will be observed that three classes are distinguished 
as in the text of Tregelles and Tischendorf, and in A, ods μὲν ἐλέγχετε 
διακρινομένους, ols δὲ σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες, ols δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ, 


and $, ols μὲν ἐλεᾶτε διακρινομένους, ols δὲ σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες, οὗς 


250 INTRODUCTION 


δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ. We should draw the same conclusion from the 
seeming quotation in Can. Apost. vi. 4 (οὐ μισήσεις πάντα ἄνθρωπον, 
ἀλλὰ) obs μὲν ἐλέγξεις, ods δὲ ἐλεήσεις, περὶ ὧν δὲ προσεύξῃ (ots δὲ ἀγαπή- 
σεις ὑπὲρ τὴν ψυχήν σου), which occurs also, with the omission of the 
cause ols δὲ ἐλεήσεις in the Didaché ii. 7. 

. Two classes only are distinguished in the following: Syrp. Et 
quosdam de illis quidem ex igne rapite; cum autem resipuerint, 
misevemini super eis in timore, representing καὶ ods μὲν ἐκ πυρὸς 
ἁρπάζετε, διακρινομένους δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ. Syrh. et hos quidem misere- 
mini resipiscentes, hos autem servate de igne rapientes in timore, 
representing καὶ ols μὲν ἐλεᾶτε διακρινομένους, obs δὲ σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς 
ἁρπάζοντες ἐν φόβῳ. Clem. (Adumbr.) quosdam autem salvate de igne 
rapientes, quibusdam vero miseremini in timore,) representing ots δὲ 
σώΐετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες, ols δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ. Clem. Stvom. vi. 773, 
καὶ oUs μὲν ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάΐζετε, διακρινομένους δὲ ἐλεεῖτε, implying that he 
was acquainted with two different recensions. With these we may 
compare the texts of B, followed by WH. and B. Weiss, καὶ ots μὲν 
ἐλεᾶτε διακρινομένους σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες, ols δὲ ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ, Of 
C, καὶ οὗς μὲν ἐλέγχετε διακρινομένους, ols δὲ σώζετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες 
ἐν φόβῳ, and of KLP, καὶ ods μὲν ἐλεεῖτε διακρινόμενοι, οὖς δὲ ἐν φόβῳ 
σώΐετε ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες. 

St. Jude’s predilection for triplets, as in vv. 2, 4, 8, in the examples 
of judgment in vv. 5-7, and of sin in v. 11, is prima facie favourable 
to the triple division in this passage. Supposing we take A and §® to 
represent the original, consisting of three members, a ὃ c, we find B 
complete in a and c, but confused as to 6. As it stands, it gives an 
impossible reading; since it requires ois μέν to be taken as the rela- 
tive, introducing the subordinate verb ἐλεᾶτε, depending on the prin- 
cipal verb odfete ; while ods δέ, on the other hand, must be taken as 
demonstrative. WH suggest that ἐλεᾶτε has crept in from below. 
Omitting this, we get the sense, ‘Some who doubt save, snatching 
them from fire; others compassionate in fear’’. It seems an easier 
explanation to suppose that ἐλεᾶτε was written in error for ἐλέγχετε 
and οὕς omitted in error after διακρινομένους. The latter phenomenon 
is exemplified in the readings of Syrp. and Clem. Str. 773. The 
texts of C and KLP are complete in a and ὦ, but insert a phrase 
from cin b. The most natural explanation here seems to be that 
the duplication of ἐλεᾶτε in a and ὁ (as in &) caused the omission of 

1The paraphrase continues, id est ut eos qui in ignem cadunt doceatis ut semet 
ipsos liberent. (It would seem that this clause has got misplaced and should be in- 
serted after rapientes.) Odientes, inquit, eam, quae carnalis est, maculatam tunicam ; 


animae videlicet tunica macula (read maculata) est, spiritus concupiscentiis pollutus 
carnalibus. 


INTRODUCTION 251 


the second ἐλεᾶτε, and therefore of the second ofs δέ. The reading 
διακρινόμενοι in KLP was a natural assimilation to the following 
nominative ἁρπάζοντες, and seemed, to those were not aware of the 
difference in the meaning of the active and middle of διακρίνω, to 
supply a very appropriate thought, viz., that discrimination must be 
used; treatment should differ in different cases. 

The real difficulty however of the triple division is to arrive at a 
clear demarcation between the classes alluded to. ‘The triple divi- 
sion,” says Hort (App. p. 107), “gives no satisfactory sense ” ; and it 
certainly has been very diversely interpreted, some holding with Kiihl 
that the first case is the worst and the last the most hopeful: “ Die 
dritte Klasse. . . durch helfendes Erbarmen wieder hergestellt wer- 
den kénnen, mit denen es also nicht so schlimm steht, wie mit denen, 
welchen gegeniiber nur ἐλέγχειν zu tiben ist, aber auch nicht so schlimm, 
wie mit denen, die nur durch rasche, zugreifende That zu retten 
sind’’; while the majority take Reiche’s view of a climax: ‘a dubi- 
tantibus minusque depravatis . . . ad insanabiles, quibus opem ferre 
pro tempore ab ipsorum contumacia prohibemur”. My own view is 
that Jude does not here touch on the case of the heretical leaders, of 
whom he has spoken with such severity before. In their present 
mood they are not subjects of ἔλεος, any more than the Pharisees con- 
demned by our Lord, as long as they persisted in their hostility to the 
truth. The admonition here given by St. Jude seems to be the same 
as that contained in the final verses of the Epistle written by his 
brother long before: ἐάν τις ἐν ὑμῖν πλανηθῇ ἀπὸ τῆς ἀληθείας καὶ ἐπιστ- 
ρέψῃ τις αὐτόν, γινώσκετε ὅτι ὁ ἐπιστρέψας ἁμαρτωλὸν ἐκ πλάνης ὁδοῦ αὐτοῦ 
σώσει ψυχὴν ἐκ θανάτου͵ The first class with which the believers are 
called upon to deal is that of doubters, διακρινόμενοι, men still halting 
between two opinions (cf. James i. 6), or perhaps we should under- 
stand it of disputers, as in Jude 9. These they are to reprove and con- 
vince (cf. John xvi. 8, 9, ἐλέγξει περὶ ἁμαρτίας ὅτι οὐ πιστεύουσιν εἰς ἐμέ). 
Then follow two classes undistinguished by any special characteristic, 
whose condition we can only conjecture from the course of action to 
be pursued respecting them. The second class is evidently in more 
imminent danger than the one we have already considered, since they 
are to be saved by immediate energetic action, snatching them from 
the fire; the third seems to be beyond human help, since the duty of 
the believers is limited to trembling compassion, expressing itself no 
doubt in prayer, but apparently shrinking from personal communica- 
tion with the terrible infection of evil. We may compare with this 
St. Paul’s judgment as to the case of incest in the Church of Corinth 
(1 Cor. v. 5), and the story told about Cerinthus and St. John. 


At a) tl rf bats ἡ 
ΤΗΝ mee ΤῸΝ (Ὁ ἮΝ Aah 
“ἣν PAGS: stat “ae δ) vay 
cH LP Sete, μ ale NU 
a ati ree | et) Oe tied alae Ui. 
ἐπῆν Μὴ ἅν ni Om ἡ ἥἡ τὰ ὙΠ is Hen 
pani τὴν ia HS ἐν si ie 


ip a es 


(Vis δὶ 


Uhh ae ὧς 4 ise t 
yen chi itt ᾿ 
‘ei δε δ ab hae ὃ 
“ἀπ νι aaa ᾿ 
ἵν id 


ta vant Cu Be 


o en) 
' ni Τ᾿ A bs yf 


ἢ ΠΡ ΝΝ Ka 
"δ. 4 ᾿ 
, we) Μ᾿ fis, 
ΠῚ πω ΓΝ 
' 's apa 
ia Ὁ. th sine 
be ane ᾿ μαι TOUT ae (he eth gin ‘tbe nt hah 
ua f Oat Se ia) ΤΡ 
: i ΠΝ" ; “ΜᾺ ἢ ἣ Wy ue 
petal Hi, it ET UE ΜΗΝῚ τὰ ᾿ ' 
' ἤν ὙΠ ΜΝ ane 1M WAMU ED | δ if 
ἡ if ἀνα: five Py: Vy ee ἊΨ 1 η ͵ 


baie γα ae } 
ala ἐπ YEP RED an cane 


Hit, ἮΝ ΠΝ γά. 
y int | aN hati y 


ἼΩ 





IOYAA 


ἘΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ. 


I. ἼΟΥΔΑΣ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ δοῦλος, ἀδελφὸς δὲ ᾿Ιακώβου, τοῖς ' ἐν 


l τοις θεῳ -. « και εν ἰησου conj. H (Sel. Read. p. 106). 


Vv. 1, 2.—Salutation. Jude a servant 
of Jesus Christ and brother of James, to 
those who have received the divine cal- 
ling, beloved of the Father, kept safe in 
Jesus Christ. May mercy, peace and 
love be richly poured out upon you! 

I. ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ δοῦλος. The same 
phrase is used by St. James in the In- 
scription to his epistle, also by St. Paul 
in Rom. and Phil. In 1 Pet. the phrase 
used is ἀπόστολος I. X., in 2 Pet. δοῦλος 
καὶ ἀπόστολος. It is, 1 think,a mistake 
to translate δοῦλος by the word “slave,” 
the modern connotation of which is so 
different from that of the Greek word (cf. 
2 Cor. iv. 5). There is no opposition 
between δουλεία and ἐλευθερία in the 
Christian’s willing service. It only be- 
comes a δουλεία in the opposed sense, 
when he ceases to love what is com- 
manded and feels it as an external yoke. 

ἀδελφὸς δὲ ᾿Ιακώβου. Cf. Tit. i. 1, 
δοῦλος Θεοῦ, ἀπόστολος δὲ “Il. X. See 
Introduction on the Author. 

τοῖς ἐν Θεῷ πατρὶ ἠγαπημένοις καὶ 
Ἰησοῦ Χριστῷ τετηρημένοις κλητοῖς. 
On the readings see Introduction on the 
text. The easier reading of some MSS., 
ἡγιασμένοις for ἠγαπημένοις, is probably 
derived from 1 Cor. i. 2, ἡγιασμένοις ἐν Χ. 
Ἴ. There is no precise parallel either for 
ἐν Θεῷ ἦγ. or for Χριστῷ ter. The pre- 
position év is constantly used to express 
the relation in which believers stand to 
Christ: they are incorporated in Him as 
the branches in the vine, as the living 
stones in the spiritual temple, as the 
members in the body of which He is the 
head. So here, ‘‘ beloved as members of 
Christ, reflecting back his glorious 
image’’ would be a natural und easy 
conception. Lightfoot, commenting on 
Col. ili. 12, ἐκλεκτοὶ τοῦ Θεοῦ, ἅγιοι καὶ 
ἠγαπημένοι, says that in the N.T. the 
last word ‘‘ seems to be used always of 
the objects of God’s love,”’ but it is diffi- 


cult to see the propriety of the phrase, 
‘Brethren beloved by God in God”, 
Ἠγαπημένοι is used of the objects of 
man’s love in Clem. Hom. ix. 5, τῶν 
αὐτοῖς ἠγαπημένων τοὺς τάφους ναοῖς 
τιμῶσιν, and the cognate ἀγαπητοί is 
constantly used in the same sense (as 
below ver. 3), as well as in the sense of 
“beloved of God’. If, therefore, we 
are to retain the reading, I am disposed 
to interpret it as equivalent to ἀδελφοί, 
“beloved by us in the Father,”? z.¢., “" be- 
loved with φιλαδελφία as children’ of 
God,” but I think that Hort is right in 
considering that év has shifted its place 
in the text. See his Select Readings, p. 
106, where it is suggested that ἐν should 
be omitted before Θεῷ and inserted before 
Ἰησοῦ, giving the sense “to those who 
have been beloved by the Father, and 
who have been kept safe in Jesus from 
the temptations to which others have 
succumbed,” ἠγαπημένοις being followed 
by a dative of the agent, as in Nehem. 
xili. 26, ἀγαπώμενος TO Θεῷ ἦν. 

κλητοῖς is here the substantive of 
which ἠγαπημένοις and τετηρημένοις 
are predicated. We find the same use 
in Apoc. xvii. 14 (νικήσουσιν) ot μετ᾽ 
αὐτοῦ κλητοὶ κ. ἐκλεκτοὶ κ. πιστοί, in 
St. Paul’s epistles, as in Rom. i. 6, ἐν οἷς 
ἐστε καὶ ὑμεῖς, κλητοὶ ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ, I 
Cor. i. 24, κηρύσσομεν Χριστὸν ἐσταυρω- 
μένον, ᾿Ιουδαίοις μὲν σκάνδαλον ... 
αὐτοῖς δὲ τοῖς κλητοῖς Χριστὸν Θεοῦ 
δύναμιν. We have many examples of 
the Divine calling in the Gospels, as in 
the case of the Apostles (Matt. iv. 21, 
Mark i. 20) and in the parables of the 
Great Supper and the Labourers in the 
Vineyard. This idea of calling or elec- 
tion is derived fromthe O.T. See Hort’s 
n.on I Pet. i. τ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ ἐκλεκ- 
τοῖς: ‘* Two great forms of election are 
spoken of in the O.T., the choosing of 
Israel, and the choosing of single 


254 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ETTSTOAH 


I_— 


Θεῷ πατρὶ ἠγαπημένοις 1 καὶ Ἰησοῦ Χριστῷ τετηρημένοις κλητοῖς. 


2. ἔλεος ὑμῖν καὶ εἰρήνη καὶ ἀγάπη πληθυνθείη. 
3. ᾿Αγαπητοί, πᾶσαν σπουδὴν ποιούμενος γράφειν ὑμῖν περὶ τῆς. 


᾿ ἡγαπημενοις ABW; ἡγιασμενοις KLP. 


Israelites, or bodies of Israelites, to 
perform certain functions for Israel. 
. . . The calling and the choosing imply 
each other, the calling being the outward 
expression of the antecedent choosing, 
the act by which it begins to take effect. 
Both words emphatically mark the pre- 
sent state of the persons addressed as 
being due to the freeagency of God... . 
In Deuteronomy (iv. 37) the choosing, 
by God is ascribed to His own love of 
Israel: the ground of it lay in Himself, 
not in Israel... . As is the election of 
the ruler or priest within Israel for the 
sake of Israel, such is the election of 
Israel for the sake of the whole human 
race. Such also, still more clearly and 
emphatically, is the election of the new 
Israel.””, For a similar use of the word 
“‘call” in Isaiah, cf. ch. xlviii. 12, xliii. 
I, 7. The chief distinction between the 
the “‘calling’”’ of the old and of the new 
‘dispensation is that the former is rather 
expressive of dignity (‘called by the 
name of God”’), the latter of invitation ; 
but the former appears also in the N.T. 
in such phrases as James ii. 7, TO καλὸν 
ὄνομα τὸ ἐπικληθὲν ἐφ᾽ ὑμᾶς, and 1 Pet. 
ii. Q, ὑμεῖς δὲ γένος ἐκλεκτόν, βασίλειον 
ἱεράτευμα... λαὸς εἰς περιποίησιν. 
The reason for St. Jude’s here character- 
ising the called as beloved and kept, is 
because he has in his mind others who 
had been called, but had gone astray and 
incurred the wrath of God. 

Ver. 2. For the Salutation see my 
note on χαίρειν, James i. 1, and Hort’s 
excellent note on 1 Pet. i. 2, χάρις... 
πληθυνθείη. We find ἔλεος and εἰρήνη 
joined in Gal. vi. 16, and with the addi- 
tion of χάρις in τ Tim. i. 2, 2 Tim. i. 2, 
2 John 3. The mercy of God is the 
ground of peace, which is perfected in 
the feeling of God’s love towards them. 
The verb πληθυνθείη occurs in the Saluta- 
tion both of 1 Peter and 2 Peter and in 
Dan. vi. 25 (in the letter of Darius), 
εἰρήνη ὑμῖν πληθυνθείη, cf. τ Thess. iil. 
12, ὑμᾶς δὲ ὁ κύριος πλεονάσαι καὶ πε- 
ρισσεύσαι τῇ ἀγάπῃ εἰς ἀλλήλους. 
᾿Αγάπη (=the love of God) occurs also 
in the final salutation of 2 Cor. ἣ χάρις 
τ. κυρίου Ἰησοῦ καὶ ἡ ἀγάπη τοῦ Θεοῦ, 


and in Eph. εἰρήνη τοῖς ἀξελφοῖς καὶ 
ἀγάπη μετὰ πίστεως ἀπὸ Θεοῦ πατρὸς 
καὶ Κυρίου Ἰ. X. Cf. τ John iii. 1, ἴδετε 
ποταπὴν ἀγάπην δέδωκεν ἡμῖν ὁ πατὴρ 
ἵνα τέκνα Θεοῦ κληθῶμεν, where West- 
cott’s n. is “The Divine love is infused into 
them, so that it is their own, and be- 
comes in them the source of a divine 
life (Rom. xili, ro). In virtue of this 
gift they are inspired with a love which 
is like the love of God, and by this they 
truly claim the title of children of God 
as partakers in His nature, 1 John iv. 7, 
19.” The same salutation is used in 
the letter of the Smyrnaeans (c. 156 A.D.) 
giving an account of the martyrdom of 
Polycarp, ἔλεος καὶ εἰρήνη καὶ ἀγάπη 
Θεοῦ πατρὸς καὶ Κυρίου ἡμῶν ᾿ἸἸ. Χ. πλη- 
θυνθείη. The thought of ἔλεος and 
ἀγάπη recurs again in ver. 21. 

Vv. 3, 4.—Reasons for Writing. He 
had been intending to write to them on 
that which is the common interest of all 
Christians, salvation through Christ, but 
was compelled to abandon his intention 
by news which had reached him of 8 
special danger* threatening the Gospel _ 
once for alldeliveredtothe Church. His 
duty now was to stir up the faithful to 
defend their faith against insidious as- 
saults, long ago foretold in ancient pro- 
phecy, of impious men who should 
change the doctrine of God’s free grace 
into an excuse for licentiousness, and 
deny the only Master and our Lord 
Jesus Christ. 

Ver. 3. ἀγαπητοί occurs in vv. 17 and 
20, also in 2 Pet. iii. 1, 8, 14, 17, 1 Pet. 
ii. II, iv. 12 and James. It is common 
in the Epistles of John and of Paul, 
sometimes with pov attached, as in 1 
Cor. x. 14, Phil. ii. 12, and is often joined 
to ἀδελφοί, especially in James. The 
ἀγάπη of ver. 2 leads on to the ἄγαπητοί 
here. They are themselves ἀγαπητοί 
because the love of God is shed abroad 
in their hearts. 

πᾶσαν σπουδὴν ποιούμενος. For 
πᾶσαν, see my n. on Jamesi. 2, and ¢f. 
2 Pet. i. 5, σπουδὴν πᾶσαν παρεισενέγ- 
καντες, i. 15, σπουδάσω ἔχειν ὑμᾶς 
μνήμην ποιεῖσθαι, also Isocr. Orat. v. p. 
gi ὦ, πᾶσαν τὴν σπουδὴν περὶ τούτου 


* For this see the Introduction on Early Heresies. 


3: ΙΟΥΔΑ ENISTOAH 


255 


κοινῆς ἡμῶν 1 σωτηρίας ἀνάγκην ἔσχον γράψαι 3 ὑμῖν παρακαλῶν 
ἐπαγωνίζεσθαι τῇ ἅπαξ παραδοθείσῃ τοῖς ἁγίοις πίστει. 


1 κοινης μων] K. υμων boh.; om. ἡμων KLP + ; σωτηριας] add. και ζωης N. 


ἤγραψαι] γραφειν SX. 


ποιεῖσθαι, Plato, Euthyd. 304 e, περὶ 
οὐδενὸς ἀξίων ἀναξίαν σπουδὴν ποιοῦνται. 
Jude was busy on another subject, when 
he received the news of a fresh danger to 
the Church, which he felt it his duty to 
meet at once. Whether he lived to 
carry out his earlier design, and whether 
it was of the nature of a treatise or of an 
epistle, we know not. It is noteworthy 
that there is a similar allusion in 2 Peter 
iii. I to an earlier letter now lost. Com- 
pare Barn. iv. 9, πολλὰ δὲ θέλων γράφειν 
2 + + γράφειν ἐσπούδασα. 

κοινῆς σωτηρίας. Cf. Tit. i. 4, κατὰ 
κοινὴν πίστιν, Ign. Eph. i., ὑπὲρ τοῦ 
κοινοῦ ὀνόματος καὶ ἐλπίδος with Light- 
foot’s n., Jos. Ant. 10. 1. 3 (Hezekiah 
besought Isaiah to offer sacrifice) ὑπὲρ 
τῆς κοινῆς σωτηρίας. Bede explains as 
follows: “omnium electorum communis 
est salus, fides, et dilectio Christi’. Jude 
puts on one side the address he was pre- 
paring on the main principles of Chris- 
tianity (probably we may take vv. 20 and 
21 as a sample of what this would have 
been) and turns to the special evil which 
was then threatening the Church. 
ἀνάγκην ἔσχον γράψαι. Cf. Luke 
xiv. 18, ἔχω ἀνάγκην ἰδεῖν αὐτόν, Heb. 
Wit.) 27; al., also. Plut. (Cato Mz: 24, 
ἀνάγκην ἔσχεν ἐκβαλεῖν ἀσχημονοῦσαν 
τὴν γυναῖκα. There is a similar com- 
bination of γράφειν and γράψαι in 3 
John 13. The aor. γράψαι, contrasted 
with the preceding pres. γράφειν, im- 
plies that the new epistle had to be writ- 
ten at once and could not be prepared 
for at leisure, like the one he had pre- 
viously contemplated. It was no wel- 
come task: ‘necessity was laid upon 
him ”’. 

ἐπαγωνίζεσθαι τῇ ἅπαξ παραδοθείσῃ 
τοῖς ἁγίοις πίστει. “Τὸ contend for the 
faith,” almost equivalent to the ἀγώνισαι 
περὶ τὴς ἀληθείας in Sir. iv. 28, see 1 

im. vi. 12, ἀγωνίζου τὸν καλὸν ἀγῶνα 
τῆς πίστεως, and εἰς ὃ κοπιῶ ἀγωνιζόμε- 
vos, Col. i. 29. We may compare ἐπα- 
μύνειν, ἐπαναπαύειν νόμῳ, Rom. ii. 17 
and Clem. Strom, iii., p. 553, ἐπαγωνιζό- 
μενος τῇ ἀθέῳ δόξῃ. It is possible (as is 
shown by the following examples) for 
Spiritual blessings, once given, to be lost, 
unless we use every effort to maintain 
them. The redemption from Egypt was 


a fact, as baptism into the name of Christ 
is a fact, but, unless it is borne in mind 
and acted upon, the fact loses its efficacy. 

τῇ ἅπαξ παραδοθείσῃ τοῖς ἁγίοις 
πίστει. The word πίστις here is not 
used in its primary sense of a subjective 
feeling of trust or belief, but in the 
secondary sense of the thing believed, 
the Truth or the Gospel, as in ver. 20 
below, Gal. i. 23, 6 διώκων ἡμᾶς ποτε 
viv εὐαγγελίζεται τὴν πίστιν ἥν ποτε 
ἐπόρθει, also Gal. iii. 23, Phil. i. 27, 
συναθλοῦντες τῇ πίστει TOU εὐαγγελίου, 
where see Lightfoot, Acts vi. 7. In the 
same way ἐλπίς is used in a concrete 
sense for the object or ground of hope (as 
in Col. i. 5, τὴν ἐλπίδα τὴν ἀποκειμένην 
ὑμῖν, τ Tim. i τ, Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ τῆς 
ἐλπίδος ἡμῶν, Tit. ii. 13, προσϑεχόμενοι 
τὴν μακαρίαν ἐλπίδα), and φόβος for the 
object of fear, Rom. xiii. 3, 1 Pet. iii. 
14. 
ἅπαξ. Used here in its classical sense 
‘once for all,” as below ver. 5, and in 
Heb. vi. 4, τοὺς ἅπαξ φωτισθέντας, id. 
ἐπ. 20, 27, x2, 0) Pet. m1. τὸς This ex- 
cludes the novelties of the Libertines, 
cf. Gal. 1. 9. The later sense “‘ on one 
occasion ”’ is found in 2 Cor. xi. 25, ἅπαξ 
ἐλιθάσθην, τ Thess. ii. 18, καὶ ἅπαξ καὶ 
δὶς ἠθελήσαμεν ἐλθεῖν. 

παραδοθείσῃ. Cf. Philo M. i. 387, 
πιστεύει τοῖς ἅπαξ παραδοθεῖσι. The 
Christian tradition is constantly referred 
to by the Fathers, as by Clem. Al. Str. 
vii. where we read of ἣ ἀληθὴς παράδοσις 
(Ρ. 845), ἢ ἐκκλησιαστικὴ π. (p. 800), 
ἡ θεία π. (p. 806), ἣ πάντων τῶν 
ἀποστόλων π. (p. goo), αἱ τοῦ Χριστοῦ 
a. (p. gor), and even in) the N.T. as in 
1 Cor. xi. 2, κάθως παρέδωκα ὑμῖν τὰς 
παραδόσεις κατέχετε, 2 Thess. ii. 15, 
1 Tim. vi. 20, τὴν παραθήκην φύλαξον. 
For an account of the gradual-formation 
of the Creed, see A. E. Burn’s Introduc- 
tion to the Creeds, ch. ii., 1899, and com- 
pare the comment in my larger edition, 
p. 6x f. 

τοῖς ἁγίοις. Used generally of Chris- 
tians who were consecrated and called to 
be holy, as in 1 Cor. i. 2, Phil. i. 1, where 
see Lightfoot. The word contains an 
appeal to the brethren to stand fast 
against the teaching and practice of the 
Libertines. 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ἘΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


4-- 


4. παρεισεδύησαν ἶ γάρ τινες ἄνθρωποι, οἱ πάλαι προγεγραμμένοι 


> A Q , > a x An Ὡς τὺ» hom , , 
εἰς τοῦτο τὸ κρίμα, ἀσεβεῖς, THY τοῦ Θεοῦ ἡμῶν χάριτα μετατιθέν- 


l παρεισεδνησαν Β, WH; παρεισεδυσαν SACKLP + Ti., Treg. 


256 
Ver. 4. Nature of the Threatened 
Danger. It is stealthy; it is serious 


enough to have been predicted long ago; 
its characteristic is impiety, showing it- 
self in the antinomian misuse of the 
Gospel of God’s free grace, and in the 
denial of God and Christ. 
_ Ver. 4. παρεισεδύησαν yap τινες 
ἄνθρωποι. For this form which is found 
in B and adopted by WH, Veitch cites 
διεκδυῆναι in Hippocr. i. 601, and com- 
pares ἐφύην, éppvnv. The aor. is here 
used with the perfect force, as in ver. 11 
ἐπορεύθησαν, etc. cf. Blass, Gr. p. 199, 
my edition of St. James, p. ccii., and Dr. 
Weymouth there cited. The verb occurs 
in Demades 178, ἄδικος παρεισδύνων 
λόγος εἰς τὰς τῶν δικαστῶν γνώμας οὐκ 
ἐᾷ συνορᾶν τὴν ἀλήθειαν, Clem. Al. p. 
650, ὅπως εἰς τὴν τῶν αἰνιγμάτων ἔννοιαν 
ἡ ζήτησις παρεισϑδύουσα ἐπὶ τὴν εὕρεσιν 
τῆς ἀληθείας ἀναδράμῃ, D. Laert. ii. 142, 
λαθραίως παρεισδύς εἰς τὴν πατρίδα, 
Plut. M. p. 216 B, τὰ ἀρχαῖα νόμιμα 
ἐκλυόμενα ἑώρα, ἄλλα δὲ παρεισδυόμενα 
μοχθηρά, other examples in Wetst. The 
noun παρείσδυσις occurs in Barn. ii. 
το, iv. 9, ἀντιστῶμεν ἵνα μὴ σχῇ 
παρείσδυσιν ὁ μέλας, Clem. Al. p. 180, 
ἀκροσφαλὴς ἣ τοῦ οἴνου παρείσδυσις. 
Similar compounds are παρεισφέρω in 
2 Pet. i. 5, παρεισάγω in 2 Pet. ii. 1, 
παρείσακτος in Gal. ii. 4, διὰ τοὺς 
παρεισάκτους ψευδαδέλφους οἵτινες 
παρεισῆλθον κατασκοπῆσαι τὴν ἐλευ- 
θερίαν ὑμῶν, Rom. ν. 20, 2 Macc. viii. 1 
παρεισπορευόμενοι λεληθότως εἰς τὰς 
κώμας, SO παρεισέρπω, παρεισπέμπω, 
παρεισπίπτω. The earliest prophecy 
of such seducers comes from the lips of 
Jesus Himself, Matt. vii. 15, προσέχετε 
ἀπὸ τῶν ψευδοπροφητῶν, οἵτινες Ep- 
χονται πρὸς ὑμᾶς ἐν ἐνδύμασι προβάτων, 
ἔσωθεν δέ εἰσι λύκοι ἅρπαγες, cf. Acts 
xx. 29, 30, and Introduction on the Early 
Heresies in the larger edition. 

οἱ πάλαι προγεγραμμένοι εἰς τοῦτο τὸ 
κρίμα. “Designated of old for this 
judgment.” Cf. 2 Pet. ii. 3, οἷς τὸ κρίμα 
ἔκπαλαι οὐκ ἀργεῖ. The word πάλαι 


precludes the supposition that the second 
epistle of Peter can be referred to.* The 
allusion is to the book of Enoch quoted in 
vv. 14, 15. In ver. 18 below the same 
warning is said to have been given by 
the Apostles. The phrase ot mpoy. is in 
apposition to τινες ἄνθρωποι, cf. Gal. 
i. 7 with Lightfoot’s n., Luke xviii. 9, 
εἶπεν δὲ πρός τινας τοὺς πεποιθότας 
ἐφ᾽ ἑαυτοῖς. For mpoy., cf. Rom. xv. 4, 
ὅσα yap προεγράφη eis τὴν ἡμετέραν 
διδασκαλίαν ἐγράφη. The word is in- 
tended to show that they are already 
doomed to punishment as enemies of 
God. As such they are to be shunned 
by the faithful, but not to be feared, 
because, dangerous as they may seem, 
they cannot alter the Divine purpose. 
Dr. Chase compares Hort’s interesting 
note on 1 Peter ii. 8, eis ὃ καὶ ἐτέθησαν. 
By ‘‘this” Spitta understands ‘that 
judgment which I am now about to de- 
clare,” #.e., the condemnation contained 
in the word ἀσεβεῖς used by some ancient 
writer. Zahn however remarks that 
οὗτος usually refers to what precedes, 
and he would take τοῦτο here (with Hof- 
mann) as referring to παρεισεδύησαν. 
Better than this logical reference to some 
preceding or succeeding word is, I think, 
Bengel’s explanation “ the now impend- 
ing judgment,” Afostolo iam quast cer- 
nente poeenam. 

ἀσεβεῖς. This word may be almost 
said to give the keynote to the Epistle 
(cf. vv. 15, 18) as it does to the Book of 
Enoch. 

THY τοῦ Θεοῦ ἡμῶν χάριτα μετα- 
τιθέντες εἰς ἀσέλγειαν. With this we 
may compare I Peter ii. 16, μὴ ὡς 
ἐπικάλυμμα ἔχοντες τὴς κακίας τὴν 
ἐλευθερίαν, 2 Peter ii. 19, ἐλευθερίαν 
ἐπαγγελλόμενοι, iii. 16, δυσνόητά τινα, 
ἃ οἱ ἀμαθεῖς στρεβλοῦσιν πρὸς τὴν ἰδίαν 
αὐτῶν ἀπώλειαν, Rom. iii. 1, 2, 5-8 (If 
man is justified by free grace and not by 
works, then works are unnecessary), 2b. 
Vi. 1, 15, Vill. 21, 0 ὍΣ, vin be, ΚΣ ἘΣ ΝΣ 
John viii. 32-36, Gal. v. 13, ὑμεῖς ἐπ᾽ 
ἐλευθερίᾳ ἐκλήθητε μόνον μὴ τὴν 


* Zahn, it is true, following Schott and others, argues in favour of this reference, 
holding that πάλαι may be equivalent to “lately’’; and the word is of course 


very elastic in meaning; 


but unless the contrast makes it clear that the reference 


is to a recent past, I think we are bound to assign to the word its usual force, 
especially here, where it stands first, giving the tone as it were to what follows, 
and is further confirmed and explained by ἕβδομος ἀπὸ *Addp in ver. 14. 


δὶ | ΙΟΥΔΑ ENISTOAH 


257 


3 3 ‘ Ἀ , ὃ ; 1 ‘ , ey ἴα a“ 
τες εἰς ἀσέλγειαν Kal τὸν μόνον δεσπότην ἦ καὶ κύριον ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦν 


1 δεσποτην] add. θεον KLP, syrr. +. 


ἐλευθερίαν εἰς ἀφορμὴν τῇ σαρκί. For 
μετατιθέντες see Gal. i. 6, for ἀσέλγειαν 
2 Peter ii. 2, πολλοὶ ἐξακολουθήσουσιν 
αὐτῶν ταῖς ἀσελγείαις, ib. ii. 7, 18, 
1 Peter iv. 3, and Lightfoot on Gal. 
v. 19, ‘‘A man may be ἀκάθαρτος and 
hide his sin: he does not become 
ἀσελγής until he shocks public decency. 
In classical Greek the word ἀσέλγεια 
generally signifies insolence or violence 
towards another. ... In the later lang- 
uage the prominent idea is sensuality 
... of. Polyb. xxxvii. 2, πολλὴ δέ τις 
ἀσέλγεια καὶ περὶ τὰς σωματικὰς 
ἐπιθυμίας αὐτῷ συνεξηκολούθει. Thus 
it has much the same range of meaning 
as ὕβρις. On the meaning of χάρις 
see Robinson, Ephes. p. 221 f. The 
form χάριν is used elsewhere in the 
N.T., except in Acts xxiv. 27. 

τὸν μόνον δεσπότην Kal κύριον ἡμῶν 
Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν ἀρνούμενοι. So 2 Peter 
ii. I, τὸν ἀγοράσαντα αὐτοὺς δεσπότην 
ἀρνούμενοι. On the denial of God and 
Christ see στ John ii. 22, οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ 
ἀντίχριστος, 6 ἀρνούμενος τὸν πατέρα 
καὶ τὸν υἱόν, Tit. i. 16, Θεὸν ὁμολογοῦσιν 
εἰδέναι, τοῖς δὲ ἔργοις ἀρνοῦνται βδελυκ- 
τοὶ ὄντες καὶ ἀπειθεῖς καὶ πρὸς πᾶν 
ἔργον ἀγαθὸν ἀδόκιμοι, Matt. x. 33, 
ὅστιςἂν ἀρνήσηταί με ἔμπροσθεν τῶν 
ἀνθρώπων, ἀρνήσομαι Kayo αὐτὸν 
ἔμπροσθεν τοῦ πατρός μου, 7b. xxvi. 70 
(Peter’s denial). Such denial is one of 
the sins noticed in the book of Enoch, 
xxxvili. 2: “‘ When the Righteous One 
shall appear ... where will be the 
dwelling of the sinners and where the 
resting-place of those who have denied 
the Lord of Spirits?” Jb. xli. 2, xlv. 2, 
xlvi. 7, xlviii. 10: “* They will fall and not 
rise again . . . for they have denied the 
Lord of Spirits and His Anointed ”’. 

Two questions have been raised as to 
the meaning of the text, (1) is τ. μόνον 
δεσπότην to be understood of the Son, 
(2) what is the force of ἀρνεῖσθαι The 
objection to understanding δεσπότης of 
our Lord is that in every other passage 
in the N.T., where δεσπότης occurs, 
except in 2 Peter ii, 1 (on which see n.), 
it is spoken of God the Father; that, 
this being the case, it is difficult to under- 
stand how Christ can be called τὸν μόνον 
δεσπότην. It seems to me a forced ex- 
planation to say that the phrase μόνος 
δεσπότης has reference only to other 
earthly masters. No Jew could use it in 


this connexion without thinking of the 
one Master in heaven. Again μόνος is 
elsewhere used of the Father only, as in 
John v. 44, τὴν δόξαν τὴν παρὰ τοῦ 
μόνον Θεοῦ οὐ ζητεῖτε, xvii. 3, ἵνα 
γινώσκωσίν σε τὸν μόνον ἀληθινὸν Θεον 
Rom. xvi. 27, μόνῳ σόφῳ Θεῷ διὰ ᾿Ιησοῦ 
Χριστοῦ, τ Tim. i. 17, τῷ βασιλεῖ τῶν 
αἰώνων. .. μόνῳ Θεῷ τιμὴ κ. δόξα, 
1δ. vi. I5, 16, 6 μακάριος κ. μόνος 
δυνάστης 6 μόνος ἔχων ἀθανασίαν, and 
by Jude himself, below 25, μόνῳ Θεῷ 
σωτῆρι ἡμῶν διὰ °l. X., rod κυρίου ἡμῶν, 
δόξα. Wetst. quotes several passages 
in which Josephus speaks of God as 
ὃ μόνος δεσπότης. On the other hand, 
the phrase, so taken, seems to contradict 
the general rule that, where two nouns, 
denoting attributes, are joined by καί, if 
the article is prefixed to the first noun 
only, the second noun will then be an 
attribute of the same subject. In the 
present case, however, the second noun 
(κύριον) belongs to the class of words 
which may stand without the article, see 
Winer, pp. 147-163. A similar doubtful 
case is found in Tit. ii. 13, προσδεχόμενοι 
τὴν μακαρίαν ἐλπίδα Kai ἐπιφάνειαν τῆς 
δόξης τοῦ μεγάλου Θεοῦ καὶ σωτῆρος 
ἡμῶν Χ. ᾿]. ὃς ἔδωκεν ἑαυτὸν ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν 
ἵνα λυτρώσηται ἡμᾶς, where also I 
should take τοῦ μεγάλου Θεοῦ to refer 
to the Father. Other examples of the 
same kind are Eph. v. 5, οὐκ ἔχει 
κληρονομίαν ἐν τῇ βασιλείᾳ τοῦ Χριστοῦ 
καὶ Θεοῦ (where Alf. notes ‘‘ We cannot 
safely say here that the same Person 
is intended by X. κ. Θεοῦ merely on 
account of the omission of the art. ; for 
(x) any introduction of such a prediction 
regarding Christ would here be mani- 
festly out of place, (2) Θεός is so fre- 
quently anarthrous that it is not safe to 
ground any such inference on its use 
here),” 2 Thess. i. 12, ὅπως ἐνδοξασθῇ τὸ 
ὄνομα τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν ᾿Ιησοῦ ἐν ὑμῖν 
καὶ ὑμεῖς ἐν αὐτῷ κατὰ τὴν χάριν τοῦ 
Θεοῦ ὑμῶν καὶ κυρίου ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ : 
τ Tim. v. 21 (cf. 2 Tim. iv. 1), διαμαρ- 
τύρομαι ἐνώπιον τοῦ Θεοῦ καὶ Χριστοῦ 
Ἰησοῦ καὶ τῶν ἐκλεκτῶν ἀγγέλων, which 
Chrysostom explains μάρτυρα καλῶ τὸν 
Θεὸν καὶ τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ : 2 Peter i. 1, 
ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἡμῶν καὶ σωτῆρος 
Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, where see myn. The 
denial of the only Master and our Lord 
Jesus Christ may be implicit, shown by 
their comduct, though not asserted in 


258 


Χριστὸν ἀρνούμενοι. 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


4- oe 


5. Ὑπομνῆσαι δὲ ὑμᾶς βούλομαι, εἰδότας 


πάντα, ᾽ dt.” Κύριος ὅ ἅπαξ λαὸν ὁ ἐκ γῆς Αἰγύπτου σώσας τὸ δεύτε- 


vpas παντα ΚΙ, 31 syrr. Clem. Theoph. Oecon.+; vpas απαξ παντα B;. 


απαξ παντα AC? 13 vulg. + Ti. Treg. WH; απαξ παντας 


ὅτι SAB syrh; add. ὁ C?KL syrp. 


H. (Sel. Read. p. 106) 


3 κυριος SCKL syrh; Ιησους AB + ; θεος C* syrp, Clem. 
4 απαξ Aaov NY, 68, tol., syrr., boh. (ort απαξ Ino. Aaov) sah. arm. Did. Cassiod. 
Aaov απαξ Clem.; λαον ABCL, Ti., Treg., WH. 


word, as in Tit. i. 16; but it is more 
naturally taken as explicit, as in 1 John 
il. 22, where Westcott notes that a com- 
mon gnostic theory was that ‘“ ‘ the Aeon 
Christ’ descended upon the man Jesus 
at His baptism and left Him before His 
passion. Those who held such a doc- 
trine denied . . . the union of the divine 
and human in one Person . . . and this 
denial involves the loss of the Father, 
not only because the ideas of sonship 
and fatherhood are correlative, but be- 
cause . .. it is only in the Son that we 
have the [full] revelation of God as 
Father.” The phrase τὸν μόνον δεσπότην 
might also refer to the heresy attributed 
to Cerinthus by Hippolytus (Haer. vii. 
33, X. 21) οὐχ ὑπὸ TOU πρώτου θεοῦ τὸν 
κόσμον γεγονέναι ἠθέλησεν ἀλλ᾽ ὑπὸ 
δυνάμεώς τινος ἀγγελικῆς, and Irenzus 
Haer. i. 26. See Introduction on Early 
Heresies in the large edition. 

Vv. 5-13. Illustrations of Sin and 
Fudgment Derived from History and 
from Nature. The judgment impending 
over these men is borne witness to by 
well-known facts of the past, and may be 
illustrated from the phenomena of nature. 
God showed His mercy in delivering the 
Israelites from Egypt, but that was no 
guarantee against their destruction in 
the wilderness when they again sinned 
by unbelief. The angels were blessed 
beyond all other creatures, but when 
they proved unfaithful to their trust they 
were imprisoned in darkness, awaiting 
there the judgment of the great day. The 
men of Sodom (lived in a land of great fer- 
tility, they had received some knowledge 
of God through the presence and teaching 
of Lot, they had been lately rescued from 
captivity by Abraham, yet they) followed 
the sinful example of the angels, and 
their land is still a prey to the fire, bear- 
ing witness to the eternal punishment of 
sin. In spite of these warnings the 
heretics, who are now finding their way 
into the Church, persist in their wild 
hallucinations, giving themselves up to 


the lusts of the flesh, despising authority, 
and railing at angelic dignities. They 
might have been taught better by the 
example of the archangel Michael, of 
whom we are told that, when disputing 
with the devil about the body of Moses, 
he uttered no word of railing, but made 
his appeal to God. These men however 
rail at that which is beyond their know- 
ledge, while they surrender themselves 
like brute beasts to the guidance of their 
appetites, and thus bring about their 
own destruction, following in the wake 
of impious Cain, of covetous Balaam, 
and rebellious Korah. When they take 
part in your love-feasts they cause the 
shipwreck of the weak by their wanton- 
ness and irreverence. In greatness of 
profession and smallness of performance 
they resemble clouds driven by the wind 
which give no rain; or trees in autumn 
on which one looks in vain for fruit, and 
which are only useful for fuel. By their 
confident speaking and brazen assurance 
they seem to carry all before them; yet 
like the waves bursting on the shore, the 
deposit they leave is only their own 
shame. Or we might compare them to 
meteors which shine for a moment and 
are then extinguished for ever. 

Ver. 5. ὑπομνῆσαι δὲ ὑμᾶς βούλομαι, 
εἰδότας ὑμᾶς wavra.* Cf. 2 Pet. i. 12, 
διὸ μελλήσω ὑμᾶς ἀεὶ ὑπομιμνήσκειν 
καίπερ εἰδότας, 10. i. 13, διεγείρειν ὑμᾶς 
ἐν ὑπομνήσει, 2b. iii. τ, διεγείρω ὑμῶν ἐν 
ὑπομνήσει τὴν εἰλικρινῆ διάνοιαν, Rom. 
XV. 14, πέπεισμαι δὲ ὅτι καὶ αὐτοὶ μεστοί 
ἐστε ἀγαθωσύνης, πεπληρωμένοι πάσης 
τῆς γνώσεως... τολμηροτέρως δὲ ἔγ- 
ραψα ὑμῖν ἀπὸ μέρους ὡς ἐπαναμιμνήσκων 
ὑμᾶς. The word εἰδότας justifies ὕπο- 
μνῆσαι: they only need to be reminded 
of truths already known, so that it is un- 
necessary to write at length. The re- 
peated ὑμᾶς contrasts the readers with 
the libertines of the former verse. The 
words in themselves might be taken 
ironically of persons professing (like the 
Corinthians) to “ know all things,” but 


* On the readings see Introduction. 


oo.) * 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


259 


pov [τοὺς] μὴ πιστεύσαντας ἀπώλεσεν, 6. ἀγγέλους τε τοὺς μὴ 
τηρήσαντας τὴν ἑαυτῶν ἀρχὴν ἀλλὰ ἀπολιπόντας τὸ ἴδιον οἰκητή- 


the broad distinction maintained through- 
out the epistle between ὑμεῖς and οὗτοι 
(the Libertines) forbids such an inter- 
pretation. If weread ἅπαξ πάντα with 
some MSS., it suggests something of 
anxiety and upbraiding, which may be 
compared with the tone of St. Paul in 
writing to the Galatians. See, however, 
the following note for the position of 
ἅπαξ. Instead of πάντα some MSS. 
have τοῦτο. The former finds some sup- 
port in Enoch i. 2, “1 heard everything 
from the angels,” xxv. 2, “1 should like 
to know about everything,” Secrets of 
En. xl. 1, 2, “1 know all things from the 
lips of the Lord. . . I know all things 
and have written all things in the books,” 
Ixi. 2 (quoted by Chase in Dict. of the 
Bible). It should probably be under- 
stood of all that follows, including the 
historical allusions, implying that those 
addressed were familiar not only with the 
0.T. but with rabbinical traditions: so 
Estius “ omnia de quibus volo vos com- 
monere”’. Bede’s note is ‘‘ omnia vide- 
licet arcana fidei scientes et non opus 
habentes recentia quasi sanctiora a novis 
audire magistris”’. In what follows he 
takes ἅπαξ with σώσας, “ita clamantes 
ad se de afflictione Aegyptia primo sal- 
vavit humiles, ut secundo murmurantes 
‘contra se in eremo prosterneret superbos. 
. .- Meminerimus illum sic per aquas 
baptismi salvare credentes, ut etiam post 
baptismum humilem in nobis requirat 
vitam.” 

ὅτι Κύριος, ἅπαξ λαὸν ἐκ γῆς Αἰγύπτου 
σώσας, τὸ δεύτερον [τοὺς] μὴ πιστεύσαν- 
τας ἀπώλεσεν.) For text, see Introduc- 
tion on Readings. Clement in his 
Adumbrationes gives the paraphrase 
*“Quoniam Dominus Deus semel popu- 
lum de terra Aegypti liberans deinceps 
os qui non crediderunt perdidit ”’. 

τὸ δεύτερον has given rise to much 
discussion. According to the reading I 
have adopted, it contrasts the preceding 
saving with the following destruction. 
The deliverance from Egypt was the 
creation of a people once for all, but yet 
it was followed by the destruction of the 
unbelieving portion of the people, z.e. by all 
but Caleb and Joshua (Num. xiv. 27, 37). 
So in 1 Cor. x. we have the privileges of 
Israel allowed, and yet all was in vain 
because of their unbelief. There seems 
less force in the connection of ἅπαξ with 


* Cf. Exod. tora, ὃν. τ, 


εἰδότας: ἤδη would have been more 
suitable. For the opposition to τὼ 
δεύτερον, cf. Heb. ix. 28, ὃ Χριστὸς ἅπαξ 
προσενεχθεὶς εἰς τὸ πολλῶν ἀνενεγκεῖν 
ἁμαρτίας ἐκ δευτέρου χωρὶς ἁμαρτίας 
ὀφθήσεται, Theoph. Avtol. ii. 26, ἵνα τὸ 
μὲν ἅπαξ ἡ πεπληρωμένον ὅτε ἐτέθη, τὸ 
δὲ δεύτερον μέλλῃ πληροῦσθαι μετὰ τὴν 
«ον. κρίσιν, Liban. af. Wetst. ἐμοὶ δὲ 
ἅπαξ ἀρκεῖ γέλωτα ὀφλεῖν, δεύτερον δὲ 
οὐκέτι. 

I am inclined to think that the article 
before μή is an intrusion, as it seems to 
be before év in ver. 12. Omitting it, we 
can take δεύτερον with μὴ πιστεύσαντας, 
getting the sense: ‘‘In the 1st case of 
unbelief (in Egypt) * salvation followed; 
in the 2nd (in the wilderness) destruc- 
tion,” lit. “when they, a second time 
failed to believe, He destroyed them”. 
If this was the original reading, it 
is easy to understand the insertion of 
τούς as facilitating the plural construc- 
tion after λαόν. We may compare the 
solemn utterance in Heb, x. 26, ἑκουσίως 
ἁμαρτανόντων ἡμῶν μετὰ Td λαβεῖν τὴν 
ἐπίγνωσιν τῆς ἀληθείας οὐκ ἔτι περὶ 
ἁμαρτιῶν ἀπολείπεται θυσία, and the 
belief, apparently based upon it, in the 
early Church as to sin after baptism. 

Ver. 6. ἀγγέλους τε τοὺς μὴ τηρήσαν- 
τας τὴν ἑαυτῶν ἀρχὴν... . εἰς κρίσιν 
- . . τετήρηκεν.] Cf. Clem. ΑἹ. Adumbr. 
** Angelos qui non servaverunt proprium 
principatum, scilicet quem acceperunt 
secundum profectum.’’ This of course 
supplies an even more striking -instance 
of the possibility of falling away from 
grace, cf. Bede, “ Qui angelis peccantibus 
non pepercit, nec hominibus parcet super- 
bientibus, sed et hos quoque cum suum 
principatum non servaverint, quo per 
gratiam adoptionis filii Dei effecti sunt, 
sed reliquerint suum domicilium, id est, 
Ecclesiae unitatem. . . damnabit’”’. On 
the Fall of the Angels see Introduction 
and the parallel passages in 2 Pet. ii. 4, 
and in Enoch, chapters 6-1o. ; 

ἀρχήν. Used of office and dignity, 
as in Gen. xl. 21 of the chief butler: 
here perhaps of the office of Watcher, 
though Spitta takes it more generally of 
the sovereignty belonging to their abode 
in heaven=Tov ἄνω κλῆρον in Clem. Al, 
650 P. The term ἀρχή is used of the 
evil angels themselves in Eph. vi. 12. 
Cf. Enoch xii. 4, of the Watchers (angels) 


V. 21, Vi. Q, Xiv. IE, 12. 


260 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ἘΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


8.5 


ριον εἰς κρίσιν μεγάλης ἡμέρας δεσμοῖς ἀϊδίοις ὑπὸ ζόφον] τετή- 
ρΉκεν 7. ὡς Σόδομα καὶ Γόμορρα καὶ αἱ περὶ αὐτὰς πόλεις, τὸν 
ὅμοιον τρόπον τούτοις 2 ἐκπορνεύσασαι καὶ ἀπελθοῦσαι ὀπίσω 


1 ζοφον] add. αγιων ἀγγελων speculum, Luc., cf. Η. (5. R. p. 106) ; 
Clem. p. 280; add. ‘tin Tartaro constrictos” Orig. 


αγριὼν ayy. 


2 +potrov τουτοις ΦΑΒΟ; tovtots τροπον KL. 


who have abandoned the high heaven 
and the holy eternal place and defiled 
themselves with women, 7b. xv. 3. Philo 
says of the fallen angels (M. i. p. 268), 
καλὸν μὴ λιποτακτῆσαι μὲν τῆς τοῦ Θεοῦ 
τάξεως, ἐν ἧ τοὺς τεταγμένους πάντας 
ἀριστεύειν ἀνάγκη, αὐτομολῆσαι δὲ πρὸς 
τὴν ἄνανδρον ἡδονήν. So Just. Μ. Afol. 
ii. 5, οἱ δ᾽ ἄγγελοι παραβάντες τήνδε τὴν 
τάξιν γυναικῶν μίξεσιν ἡττήθησαν with 
Otto’s ἢ. 

ἀπολιπόντας τὸ ἴδιον οἰκητήριον. Cf. 
2 Cor. v. 2, τὸ οἱκ. τὸ ἐξ οὐρανοῦ, and 
the quotation from Enoch in the last 
n. [For οἰκητήριον, cf. Enoch xv. 7 
(the message of Enoch to the Watchers) 
“the spiritual have their dwelling in 
heaven”, . . ἣ κατοίκησις αὐτῶν ἔσται 
ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς. Chase.] 

εἰς κρίσιν μεγάλης ἡμέρας δεσμοῖς 
ἀϊδίοις ὑπὸ ζόφον τετήρηκεν. Cf. 2 Pet. 
li. 4 σειροῖς ζόφου ταρταρώσας, id. ii. 9, 
ἀδίκους εἰς ἡμέραν κρίσεως κολαζομένους 
τηρεῖν, ἐδ. iil. 7, τηρούμενοι εἰς ἡμέραν 
κρίσεως. .. τῶν ἀσεβῶν ἀνθρώπων, 
Joel ii. 31, 6 ἥλιος μεταστραφήσεται 
εἰς σκότος . .. πρὶν ἐλθεῖν τὴν ἡμέραν 
Κυρίου τὴν μεγάλην καὶ ἐπιφανῆ, Apoc. 
vi. 17, ἦλθεν H ἡμέρα ἡ μεγάλη τῆς ὀργῆς 
αὐτοῦ, 10. xvi. 14, συναγαγεῖν αὐτοὺς εἰς 
τὸν πόλεμον τῆς μεγάλης ἡμέρας τοῦ 
Θεοῦ τοῦ παντοκράτορος. Enoch x. 5, 
ἐπικάλυψον αὐτῷ (Azazel) σκότος, καὶ 
οἰκησάτω ἐκεῖ εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα, x. 12, δῆσον 
αὐτοὺς... μέχρι ἡμέρας κρίσεως 
αὐτῶν, ἐδ. xxii. 11 (Gr. in Charles’ Aff. 
C) μέχρι τῆς μεγάλης ἡμέρας τῆς κρί- 
σεως, 7b. liv. 6, note onxly.1. 80 ἡμέρα 
τοῦ κυρίου τ Cor. i. 8, 2 Pet. iii. 10 al., 
ἐκείνη ἡ ἡμέρα 2 Th. i. το. On δεσμοῖς 
see En, liv. 3-5, “1 saw how they made 
iron chains of immeasurable weight, and 
I asked for whom they were prepared, 
and he said unto me ‘ These are prepared 
far the hosts of Azazel’.” Cf. δέσμιοι 
σκότους (Wisd. xvii. 2) of the plague of 
darkness. 

ἀϊδίοις. The chains are called “ever- 
lasting,” but they are only used for a 
temporary purpose, to keep them for the 
final judgment. It seems te be here 
synonymous with αἰώνιος in ver. 7. So 
too in the only other passages in which it 


occurs in the Bible, Wisdom vii. 26, 
ἀπαύγασμά ἐστι φωτὸς ἀϊδίου, and Rom. 
i. 20, ἣ ἀΐδιος αὐτοῦ δύναμις καὶ θειότης. 

Ver. 7. ὡς Σόδομα καὶ Γόμορρα καὶ 
αἱ περὶ αὐτὰς πόλεις. The 3rd εχ- 
ample of Divine judgment differs from 
the two others, as it tells only of the 
punishment, not of the fall from grace. 
Hence the difference of connexion éy- 
γέλους τε... .@s Σόδομα. Cf. 2 Pet. 11. 
6, πόλεις Σοδόμων καὶ Γομόρρας καταστ- 
ροφῇ κατέκρινεν. The destruction was 
notlimited to these two cities, but extended 
to all the neighbouring country (Gen. xix. 
25, called Πεντάπολις in Wisd. x. 6), in- 
cluding the towns of Admah and Zeboim 
(Deut. xxix. 23, Hos. xi. 8). Zoar was 
spared at the request of Lot. 

τὸν ὅμοιον τρόπον τούτοις ἐκπορνεύ- 
σασαι. For the adverbial acc., cf. 
Matt. xxiii. 37, ὃν τρόπον ἐπισυνάγει. 
ὄρνις Ta νοσσία, ‘2 Macc. xv. 39, ὃν 
τρόπον οἶνος... ἀποτελεῖ, οὕτω καὶ, 
Luc. Catal. 6 τεθνᾶσι τὸν ὅμοιον τρόπον. 
“Like them,” i.e. the fallen angels. 
The two judgments are similarly joined 
in Test. Nepht. 3, μὴ γένησϑε ὡς Σόδομα, 
ἥτις ἐνήλλαξε τάξιν φύσεως αὐτῆς. 
Ὁμοίως δὲ καὶ οἱ ᾿Ἐγρήγορες ἐνήλλαξαν 
τάξιν φύσεως αὐτῶν, οὺς κατηράσατο 
Κύριος. Others understand τούτοῖϊς of the 
libertines who are subsequently referred to 
as οὗτοι (vv. 8, Το, 12, 16, 19); but the 
beginning of ver. 8 (μέντοι καὶ οὗτοι) 
seems to distinguish between them and 
the preceding. The verb ἐκπ. occurs in 
Gen. xxxviii. 24 of Tamar, Exod. xxxiv. 
15, 16, (uy ποτε) ἐκπορνεύσωσιν ὀπίσω 
τῶν θεῶν αὐτῶν, Lev. xvii. 7, Hos. iv. 12, 
Ezek. xvi. 26, 28, 33. 

ἀπελθοῦσαι ὀπίσω σαρκὸς ἑτέρας. In 
the case of the angels the forbidden flesh 
(lit. ‘ other than that appointed by God”’). 
refers to the intercourse with women; 
in the case of Sodom to the departure 
from the natural use (Rom. i. 27), what 
Philo calls ἀνόμους καὶ ἐκθέσμους μίξεις. 
(de Gig. M i. p. 267), cf. Exod. xxx. 9, 
οὐκ ἀνοίσεις θυμίαμα ἕτερον. For the 
post-classical phrase cf. 2 Pet. ii. 10, τοὺς 
ὀπίσω σαρκὸς ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ μιασμοῦ πορευ- 
ομένους, Deut. iv. 3, ἐπορεύθη ὀπίσω. 
Βεελφεγώρ, Jer. ii. 2, 3. 


8. ΙΟΥΔΑ ἘΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


261 


a > » ό ὃ »" Ν 3 , δί ε έ 
σαρκὸς ἐτέρας, πρόκεινται δεῖγμα πυρὸς αἰωνίου δίκην ὑπέχουσαι. 
8. Ὁμοίως μέντοι καὶ οὗτοι ἐνυπνιαζόμενοι σάρκα μὲν μιαίνουσιν, 


πρόκεινται δεῖγμα πυρὸςαἰωνίου δίκην 
ὑπέχουσαι. Cf. Enoch lxvii. 12, “ this 
judgment wherewith the angels are 
judged is a testimony for the kings and 
the mighty,” 2 Pet. ii. 6, ὑπόδειγμα ped- 
λόντων ἀσεβέσιν τεθεικώς, τ Cor. x. 6, 
II τύποι ἐγένοντο, Heb. iv. 11 ἵνα μὴ 
ἐν τῷ αὐτῷ τις ὑποδείγματι πέσῃ τῆς 
ἀπειθείας. The present aspect of the 
Lacus Asphaltites was a conspicuous 
image of the lake of fire and brimstone 
prepared for Satan and his followers, 
Apoc. xix. 20, xx. 10, xxi. 8. It is ques- 
tioned whether πυρός is governed by 
δεῖγμα or δίκην. If by δίκην, then the 
burning of Sodom is itself spoken of as 
still going on (eternal), and this is in 
accordance with Jewish belief as recorded 
in Wisd. x. 7 (wip Πενταπόλεως) ἧς ἔτι 
μαρτύριον τῆς πονηρίας καπνιζομένη 
καθέστηκε χέρσος, Philo (De Abr. Μ. ii. 
xxi.), μέχρι νῦν καίεται. TO yap Kepav- 
νιον πῦρ ἥκιστα σβεννύμενον ἢ νέμεται 
ἢ ἐντύφεται. πίστις δὲ σαφεστάτη τὰ 
δρώμενα, τοῦ γὰρ συμβεβηκότος πάθους 
σημεῖόν ἐστιν ὅ τε ἀναδιδόμενος ἀεὶ 
καπνὸς καὶ ὃ μεταλλεύουσι θεῖον, ib. V. 
Moys. Μ. ii. p. 143. Some disallow this 
sense of αἰώνιος and think that it can 
only be used of hell-fire, as in 4 Mace. 
ΧΙ, 12 (the words of the martyr contrast- 
ing the fires of present torture with the 
eternal flames awaiting the persecutor), 
ταμιεύεταί σε ἣ θεία δίκη πυκνοτέρῳ καὶ 
αἰωνίῳ πυρί, καὶ βάσανοι εἰς ὅλον τὸν 
αἰῶνα οὐκ ἀνήσουσί oe. For an exami- 
nation of the word see Jukes, Restitution 
of all Things, p. 67 n. and cf. Jer. xxiii. 
39, 40, Ezek. xvi. 53, 55 (on the restora- 
tion of Sodom), xlvii. 1-12 (a prophecy 
ot the removal of the curse of the Dead 
Sea and its borders), Enoch. x. 5 and 12, 
where the eis αἰῶνα of the former verse 
is equivalent to seventy generations in 
the latter, also ver. 10 where ζωὴ αἰώνιος 
is reckoned at 500 years. As the mean- 
ing of δεῖγμα is made clear by the fol- 
lowing participial clause, it seems 
unnecessary to take it with πυρός in the 
sense of ‘(an example or type of eternal 
fire,” which would escape the difficulty 
connected with αἰωνίου, but leaves δίκην 
ὑπέχουσαι (for which cf. Xen. Mem. ii. 
I, 8, 2, Macc. iv. 48) a somewhat otiose 
appendage. In the book of Enoch (Ixvii. 
4 foll.) the angels who sinned are said to 
be imprisoned in a burning valley (Hin- 
nom, ch. 27) in which there was a great 


VOLES V. 


swelling of waters, accompanied by a 
smell of sulphur; and “that valley of 
the angels burned continually under the 
earth’. Charles notes on this that “ the 
Gehenna valley here includes the adjacent 
country down to the Dead Sea. A sub- 
terranean fire was believed to exist under 
the Gehenna valley.’ 

Ver. 8. ὁμοίως μέντοι καὶ οὗτοι. 


Notwithstanding these warnings the 
libertines go on in similar courses. 
ἐνυπνιαζόμενοι σάρκα μιαίνουσιν 


Compare Acts ii. 17 (a quotation from 
Joel ii. 28), ot πρεσβύτεροι ὑμῶν ἐνυπνίοις 
ἐνυπνιασθήσονται, of those that see 
visions: and so Spitta (holding that Jude 
copied from 2 Peter), would render it 
here, prefixing the article to make it 
correspond with the ψευδοπροφῆται and 
ψευδοδιδάσκαλοι of 2 Peterii. 1. Those 
who take the opposite view (viz. that 
2 Peter was copied from Jude) will see 
nothing to justify the article. The word 
is used by Isa. lvi. 10 in connexion with 
the words οὐκ ἔγνωσαν, οὐκ εἰδότες (see 
ver. τὸ below), ἐνυπνιαζόμενοι κοίτην 
φιλοῦντες νυστάξαι, which Delitsch ex- 
plains “ instead of watching and praying 
to see divine revelations for the benefit 
of the people, they are lovers of ease 
talkers in their sleep. 

Bengel explains ‘“ Hominum mere 
naturalium indoles graphice admodum 
descripta est. Somnians multa videre, 
audire, etc. sibi videtur.” And so Chase 
“‘they live in an unreal world of their 
own inflated imaginations,’’ comparing 
the conjectural reading of Col. ii. 18, 
ἀέρα κενεμβατεύων. This accords with 
ver. 10: in their delusion and their blind- 
ness they take the real for the unreal, 
and the unreal for the real. The verb 
is used both in the active and middle by 
Aristotle, Somm. i. 1, πότερον συμβαίνει 
ἀεὶ τοῖς καθεύδουσιν ἐνυπνιάζειν, ἀλλ΄ 
οὐ μνημονεύουσιν ; Probl. 30, 14, 2, οἱ ἐν 
τῷ καθεύδειν ἐνυπνιαζόμενοι ἱσταμένης 
τῆς διανοίας, καὶ καθ᾽ ὅσον ἠρεμεῖ, 
ὀνειρώττουσιν, cf. Artem. Oneir, i. 1. 
Some interpret of polluting dreams (cf. 
Ley. 15); but the word ἐνυπνιαζόμενοι 
is evidently intended to have a larger 
scope, covering not merely μιαίνουσιν 
but ἀθετοῦσιν and βλασφημοῦσιν. We 
must also interpret μιαίνω here by the 
ἀσέλγειαν of ver. 4, the ἐκπορνεύσασαι 
and σαρκὸς ἑτέρας of ver. 7. This 
wide sense appears in Tit. i. 15, τοῖς 


17 


202 ΙΟΥΔΑ ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ a 
κυριότηταΐ δὲ ἀθετοῦσιν, δόξας δὲ βλασφημοῦσιν. 9. ‘O δὲ 
1 κυριοτήητα]--τητας δᾷ Orig. 

μεμιασμένοις οὐδὲν καθαρόν, ἀλλὰ mentioned offenders. For the former 
μεμίανται αὐτῶν καὶ ὁ νοῦς καὶ % we may refer to ver. 4, Tov κύριον ἡμῶν 
συνείδησις. ἀρνούμενοι, for the latter to the contempt 
κυριότητα δὲ ἀθετοῦσιν, δόξας δὲ shown by the Israelites towards the com- 
βλασφημοῦσιν. On first reading one is mandments of God. So the desertion of 


inclined to take the words κυριότης and 
δόξαι simply as abstractions. The re- 
sult of indulgence in degrading lusts is 
the loss of reverence, the inability to 
recognise true greatness and due degrees 
of honour. This would agree with the 
description of the libertines as sharing 
in the ἀντιλογία of Korah, as κύματα 
ἄγρια θαλάσσης, as yoyyvorat uttering 
hard speeches against God. When we 
examine however the use of the word 
‘KupioTns and the patristic comments, 
and when we consider the reference to 
the archangel’s behaviour towards Satan, 
and the further explanation in ver. Io, 
where the σάρκα of ver. 8 is represented 
by ὅσα φυσικῶς ἐπίστανται, and the 
‘phrase κυριότητα ἀθετοῦσιν, δόξας δὲ 
βλασφημοῦσιν by ὅσα οὐκ οἴδασιν 
βλασφημοῦσιν, we seem to require a 
more pointed and definite meaning, not 
simply “majesty,” but ‘‘the divine 
majesty,’ not simply ‘ dignities,”’ but 
“the angelic orders”. Cf. 2 Pet. ii. 
to, Eph. i. 21 (having raised him from 
the dead and set him on his right hand) 
ὑπεράνω πάσης ἀρχῆς Kal ἐξουσίας καὶ 
δυνάμεως καὶ κυριότητος, Col. i. 16, 
ἐν αὐτῷ ἐκτίσθη τὰ πάντα ἐν τοῖς 
οὐρανοῖς καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, τὰ ὁρατὰ καὶ 
τὰ ἀόρατα, εἴτε θρόνοι εἴτε κυριότητες 
εἴτε ἀρχαὶ εἴτε ἐξουσίαι, where Light- 
foot considers .that the words are in- 
tended to be taken in their widest sense, 
including bad and good angels, as well 
as earthly dignities. In our text, how- 
ever, it would seem that the word should 
be understood as expressing the attribute 
of the true κύριος, cf. Didache, iv. τ 
(honour him who speaks the word of 
God), ‘6s κύριον, ὅθεν yap ἣ κυριότης 
λαλεῖται, ἐκεῖ κύριός ἐστιν, Herm. Sim, 
v. 6, 1, εἰς δούλου τρόπον οὐ κεῖται ὃ 
υἱὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ, ἀλλ᾽ εἰς ἐξουσίαν μεγάλην 
κεῖται καὶ κυριότητα. The verb ἀθετέω 
has God or Christ for its object in Luke 
x. 16, John xii. 48, 1 Thess. iv. 8, etc. 
We have then to consider how it can be 
said that the libertines (οὗτοι) ‘‘ despise 
authority ” in like manner to the above- 


their appointed station and abode by the 
angels showed their disregard for the 
divine ordinance, and the behaviour of 
the men of Sodom combined with the 
vilest lusts an impious irreverence to- 
wards God’s representatives, the angels 
(Gen. xix. 5). Cf. Joseph. Ant. i. τὰ. 2, 
εἰς ἀνθρώπους ἦσαν ὑβρισταὶ καὶ πρὸς 
τὸ θεῖον ἀσεβεῖς, and Test. Aser. 7, where 
the sin of Sodom is expressly stated to 
have been their behaviour towards the 
angels, μὴ γίνεσθε ὡς Σόδομα ἥτις 
ἠγνόησε τοὺς ἀγγέλους Κυρίου καὶ 
ἀπώλετο ἕως αἰῶνος. 

δόξας δὲ βλασφημοῦσιν. Cf. 2 Pet. 
11, το, τολμηταὶ αὐθάδεις δόξας οὐ τρέ- 
μουσιν βλασφημοῦντες. The only other 
passage in the N.T. in which the plural 
occurs is 1 Peter i. 11, where the sense 
is different. Dr. Bigg compares Exod. 
XV. II, Tis ὅμοιός σοι ἐν θεοῖς, Κύριε: 
τίς ὁμοιός σοι ; δεδοξασμένος ἐν ἁγίοις, 
θαυμαστὸς ἐν δόξαις. Clement’s inter- 
pretation of this and the preceding clause 
is as follows: (Adumbr. 1008) “ domi- 
nationem spernunt, hoc est solum domi- 
num qui vere dominus noster est, Jesus 
Christus . . . majestatem blasphemant, 
hoc est angelos". The word δόξα in 
the singular is used for the Shekinah, 
see my note on James ii. 1. This sug- 
gests that Clement may be right in sup- 
posing the plural to be used for the 
angels, who are, as it were, separate rays 
of that glory. Compare Philo’s use of 
the name λόγοι for the angels as con- 
trasted with the divine Λόγος. In Phila 
Monarch. ii. p. 18 the divine δόξα, is 
said to consist of the host of angels, 
δόξαν δὲ σὴν εἶναι νομίζω τάς σε 
δορυφορούσας δυνάμεις. See Test. fud. 
25, Κύριος εὐλόγησε τὸν Λευί, 6 ἄγγελος 
τοῦ προσώπου ἐμέ, αἱ δυνάμεις τῆς 
δοξης τὸν Συμεών, also Luke ix. 26, 
where it is said that ‘ the Son of Man 
will come in His own glory and in 
the glory of the Father and ot the holy. 
angels"’.* Ewald, Hist. Isr. tr. vol. 
viii. p. 142, explains ἣ κυριότης of the 
true Deity, whom they practically deny 


* There is much said of the glory of the angels in Asc. Isaiae, pp. 47, 49 ὦ 


«ἃ. Charles. 


9. [ΙΟΥΔΑ ENMIZTOAH 


263 


Μιχαὴλ ὁ ἀρχάγγελος, Ste! τῷ διαβόλῳ διακρινόμενος διελέγετο 
περὶ τοῦ Μωυσέως σώματος, οὐκ ἐτόλμησεν κρίσιν ἐπενεγκεῖν βλασ- 


19 δε Μιχαηλ... «οτε ACKL, δ᾿ ; οτε Μιχ. .-. Tore Β. 


by their dual God; αἱ δόξαι as the 
angels, whom they blaspheme by sup- 
posing that they had created the world 
in opposition to the will of the true 
‘God, whereas Michael himself submitted 
everything to Him. This last clause 
would then be an appendage to the 
preceding, with special reference to the 
case of the Sodomites (cf. John xiii. 20). 
There may also be some allusion to the 
teaching or practice of the libertines. If 
we compare the mysterious reference in 
1 Cor. xi. 10, ϑιὰ τοῦτο ὀφείλει ἣ γυνὴ 
ἐξουσίαν ἔχειν ἐπὶ τῆς κεφαλῆς διὰ τοὺς 
ἀγγέλους, which is explained by Ter- 
tullian (De Virg. Vel. 7) as spoken of 
the fallen angels mentioned by Jude, 
‘*propter angelos, scilicet quos legimus 
a Deo et caelo excidisse ob concupiscen- 
tiam feminarum,” we might suppose the 
βλασφημία, of which the libertines were 
guilty, to consist in a denial or non- 
recognition of the presence of good 
angels in their worship, or of the possi- 
bility of their own becoming κοινωνοὶ 
δαιμονίων ; or they may have scoffed at 
the warnings against the assaults of 
the devil, or even at the very idea of 
* spiritual wickedness in high places’”’. 
So understood, it prepares us for the 
strange story of the next verse. 

Ver. 9. ὃ δὲ Μιχαὴλ ὁ ἀρχάγγελος. 
‘The term apy. occurs in the N.T. only 
here and in r Thess. iv. 16. The names 
of seven archangels are given in Enoch. 
The story here narrated is taken from the 
apocryphal Assumptio Mosis, as we learn 
from Clem. Adumbr. in Ep. Fudae, 
and Orig. De Princ. ili. 2,1. Didymus 
(In Efist. fudae Enarratio) says that 
some doubted the canonicity of the 
Epistle because of this quotation from 
an apocryphal book. In Cramer’s 
Catena on this passage (p. 163) we read 
τελευτήσαντος ἐν τῷ ὄρει Μωυσέως, ὁ 
Μιχαὴλ ἀποστέλλεται μεταθήσων τὸ 
σῶμα, εἶτα τοῦ διαβόλου κατὰ τοῦ 
Μωυσέως βλασφημοῦντος καὶ φονέα 
ἀναγορεύοντος διὰ τὸ πατάξαι τὸν 
Αἰγύπτιον, οὐκ ἐνεγκὼν τὴν κατ᾽ αὐτοῦ 
βλασφημίαν ὁ ἄγγελος, ᾿Επιτιμήσαι σοι 
ὃ Θεὸς, πρὸς τὸν διάβολον ἔφη. Charles 
in his edition of the Assumption thus 
summarises the fragments dealing with 
the funeral of Moses: (1) Michael is 
commissioned to bury Moses, (2) Satan 


opposes his burial on two grounds: (a) 
he claims to be the lord of matter (hence 
the body should be handed over to him). 
To this claim Michael rejoins, ‘“ lhe 
Lord rebuke thee, for it was God’s spirit 
which created the world and all man- 
kind’. (δ) He brings the charge of 
murder against Moses (the answer to 
this is wanting). The story is based 
upon Deut. xxxiv. 6 (R.V.), “he buried 
him (mg. he was buried) in the valley 
. . . but no man knoweth of his sepul- 
chre unto this day”. Compare the vain 
search for Elijah (2 Kings ii. 16, 17). 
Further details in Josephus (Ant. iv. 
8, 48), νέφους αἰφνίδιον ὑπὲρ αὐτοῦ 
στάντος ἀφανίζεται κατά τινος φάραγ- 
γος. γέγραφε δὲ αὐτὸν ἐν ταῖς ἱεραῖς 
βίβλοις τεθνεῶτα, δείσας μὴ Sv 
ὑπερβολὴν τῆς περὶ αὐτὸν ἀρετῆς πρὸς 
τὸ θεῖον αὐτὸν ἀναχωρῆσαι τολμήσωσιν 
εἰπεῖν, Philo i. p. 165, and Clem, Al. 
(Str. vi. § 132, p. 807) where it is said 
that Caleb and Joshua witnessed the 
assumption of Moses to heaven, while 
his body was buried in the clefts of the 


mountain. See comment in the larger 
edition, pp. 74-76. ἔ 
ιακρινόμενος. Here used in the 


sense of ‘‘ disputing,” as in Jer. xv. Io, 
ἄνδρα διακρινόμενον πάσῃ TH γῇ», Joel 
iii. 2, Acts xi. 2. See my note on James 
i. 6 and below ver. 22. 

διελέγετο. Cf. Mark ix. 34, πρὸς 
ἀλλήλους διελέχθησαν, Tis μείζων. 

οὐκ ἐτόλμησεν κρίσιν ἐπενεγκεῖν 
βλασφημίας. I take βλασφημίας to 
be gen. qualitatis, expressed by the 
adjective βλάσφημον in 2 Peter: see 
below on ver. 18, James i. 25, ἀκροατὴς 
ἐπιλησμονῆς, ii. 4 κριταὶ διαλογισμῶν 
πονηρῶν, ili, 6, 6 κόσμος τῆς ἀδικίας, 
also 2 Peter ii. 1, αἱρέσεις ἀπωλείας, 
ji. 10, ἐπιθυμίᾳ pracpov. For ἐπεν- 
eyketv see Plat. Legg. ix. 856 προ- 
δόσεως αἰτίαν ἐπιφέρων, 7b. 943, TLLwpiav 
ἔπιφ. The word occurs elsewhere in 
N.T. only in Rom. iii. 5. Field (On 
Translation of N.T. p. 244) compares 
Acts xxv. 18 ot κατήγοροι οὐδεμίαν 
αἰτίαν ἔφερον ὧν ἐγὼ ὑπενόουν, Diod. 
xvi. 29, δίκην ἐπήνεγκαν κατὰ τῶν 
Σπαρτιατῶν, 7b. xx. 10, κρίσεις ἀδίκους 
ἐπιφέροντες, χχ. 62, φοβηθεὶς τὰς ἐπι- 
φερομένας κρίσεις, tom. x. p. 171 ed. 
Bip. ἐπήνεγκαν κρίσιν περὶ ὕβρεως, and 


204 


φημίας, ἀλλὰ εἶπεν ᾿Επιτιμήσαι σοι Κύριος. το. Οὗτοι δὲ 
μὲν οὐκ οἴδασιν. βλασφημοῦσιν, ὅσα δὲ φυσικῶς ὡς τὰ ἄλογα 


, 
ἐπίστανται, ἐν τούτοις φϑείρονται. 


IOYAA ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


= 


« 
οσα. 
to 


TAs ΟῚ 53 ~ eo ~ ε 
11. οὐαὶ αὐτοῖς, ὅτι τῇ ὁδ 


2 


«80 


1 κυριος] ὃ θεος SY. 


translates “durst not bring against him 
an accusation of blasphemy ” ; but surely 
that is just what he does in appealing to 
God. Besides such a statement would 
be altogether beside the point. The 
verse is introduced to show the guilt 
attached to speaking evil of dignities, 
i.e. of angels. If Michael abstained from 
speaking evil even of a fallen angel, this 
is appropriate; not so, if he simply ab- 
stained from charging the devil with 
speaking evil of Moses. 

κρίσις, like κρίνω, has the two mean- 
ings of judgment and of accusation, cf. 
Lycurg. 31 where οἱ συκοφαντοῦντες 
are distinguished from τῶν δικαίως τὰς 
κρίσεις ἐνισταμένων. 

ἐπιτιμήσαι σοι Κύριος. These words 
occur in the vision of Zechariah (iii. 1-10) 
where the angel of the Lord replies 
to the charges of Satan against the high 
priest Joshua with the words ἐπιτιμήσαι 
Κύριος ἐν σοὶ, διάβολε, καὶ ἐπιτιμήσαι 
Κύριος ἐν σοί, 6 ἐκλεξάμενος τὴν ‘lepov- 
σαλήμ. They were no doubt inserted as 
appropriate by the author of the Ass. 
Mos. in his account of the controversy 
at the grave of Moses. We may com- 
pare Matt. xvii. 18, ἐπετίμησεν αὐτῷ ὁ 
Ἰησοῦς. 

Ver. το. οὗτοι δὲ ὅσα μὲν οὐκ οἴδασιν 
βλασφημοῦσιν. The libertines do the 
contrary of what we are told of the re- 
spect shown by the angel even towards 
Satan: they speak evil of that spiritual 
world, those spiritual beings, of which 
they know nothing, cf. 2 Peter ii. 12. 
The common verb βλασῷφ. shows that 
the δόξαι of ver. 8 are identical with ὅσα 
οὐκ οἴδασιν here. For the blindness of 
the carnal mind to all higher wisdom cf. 
1 Cor. ii, 7-16, a passage linked with our 
epistle by the distinction between the 
Ψψυχικοί and πνευματικοί and by the 
words λαλοῦμεν Θεοῦ σοφίαν, ἣν οὐδεὶς 
τῶν ἀρχόντων τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου ἔγνω- 
κεν " εἰ γὰρ ἔγνωσαν οὐκ ἂν τὸν κύριον 
τῆς δόξης ἐσταύρωσαν. See too John 
vili. 19, 1 Tim. vi. 4, τετύφωται μηδὲν 
ἐπιστάμενος. For the form οἴδασιν see 
my ed. of St. James, p. clxxxiii. 

ὅσα δὲ φυσικῶς ὡς Ta ἄλογα ζῷα 
ἐπίστανται. This stands for σάρκα in 
ver. 8 and is explained by ἀσέλγειαν 
in ver. 4, ἐκπορνεύσασαι in ver. 7, 


μιαίνουσιν in ver. 8, κατὰ τὰς ἐπιθυμίας 
αὐτῶν πορευόμενοι in ver. 16. 

φυσικῶς, “by instinct,” so Dion. L. 
X. 137, φυσικῶς καὶ χωρὶς λόγου. 
Alford cites Xen. Cyvop. il. 3, 9, μάχην 
ὁρῶ πάντας ἀνθρώπους φύσει ἐπι- 
σταμένους, ὥσπερ ye καὶ τἄλλα ἵῷα 
ἐπίσταταί τινα μάχην ἕκαστα οὐδὲ παρ᾽ 
ἑνὸς ἄλλου μαθόντα ἢ παρὰ τῆς φύσεως. 

ἐν τούτοις φθείρονται. The natural 
antithesis here would have been ‘‘ these 
things they admire and delight in”. For 
this Jude substitutes by a stern irony 
“these things are their ruin”. Cf. Phil. 
iii. το, where speaking of the enemies of 
the Cross the apostle says: ὧν τὸ τέλος 
ἀπώλεια, ὧν ὃ θεὸς ἣ κοιλία, Kal ἡ δόξα 
ἐν τῇ αἰσχύνῃ αὐτῶν, Eph. iv. 22, 
ἀποθέσθαι... τὸν παλαιὸν ἄνθρωπον 
τὸν φθειρόμενον κατὰ τὰς ἐπιθυμίας. 

Ver. τι. οὐαὶ αὐτοῖς, ὅτι τῇ ὁδῷ τοῦ 
Καὶν ἐπορεύθησαν. For the use of ‘he 
aorist see note on ver. 4, παρεισεδύησαν: 
for the phrase cf. Blass, Gr. p. 119, and 
2 Peter ii. 15, ἐξακολουθήσαντες τῇ ὁδῷ 
τοῦ Βαλαάμ. The phrase ovat, so com- 
mon in Enoch, especially in cc. 94 to 
100, and in the Gospels and Apocalypse, 
occurs in the epistles only here and in 
1 Cor. ix. 16. The woe is grounded on 
the fate which awaits those who walk in 
the steps of Cain, Balaam and Korah. 
In 2 Peter Balaam is the only one re- 
ferred to of the three leaders of wicked- 
ness here named by Jude. Cain, with 
Philo, is the type of selfishness (M. 
I p. 206), πᾶς φίλαυτος ἐπίκλησιν Kaiv 
εὕρηκεν (quoted by Schneckenb. p. 221) ; 
he is named as a type of jealous hate 
in 1 John iii, 11, 12, ἵνα ἀγαπῶμεν 
ἀλλήλους . οὐ καθὼς Καὶν ἐκ TOU πονηροῦ 
ἦν καὶ ἔσφαξεν τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ " καὶ 
χάριν τίνος ἔσφαξεν αὐτὸν : ὅτι τὰ ἔργα 
αὐτοῦ πονηρὰ ἦν, τὰ δὲ τοῦ ἀδελφοῦ 
αὐτοῦ δίκαια, of unbelief in Heb. xi. 4, 
πίστει πλείονα θυσίαν “ABeA παρὰ Katy 
προσήνεγκεν τῷ Θεῷ, cf Philo, De Agric. 
1 M. 300 f., and Targ. Jer. on Gen. iv. 7, 
cited by Schneckenburger, in which Cain 
is represented as saying ‘non estjudicium, 
nec judex, nec est aliud saeculum, nec da- 
bitur merces bona justis, nec ultio sumetur 
de improbis,”’ etc. There seems no reason 
why we should not regard Cain here as 
symbolising the absence both of faith 


ΣΙ. 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


to 
Ov 
WN 


τοῦ Καὶν ἐπορεύθησαν, καὶ TH πλάνῃ τοῦ Βαλαὰμ μισθοῦ ἐξεχύθησαν, 


and of love, cf. 1 John iii. 23. Euthym. 
Zig. gives an allegorical explanation, 
καὶ αὐτοὶ ἀδελφοκτόνοι eici, δι᾿ ὧν 
διδάσκουσι τὰς τῶν ἀπατωμένων ψυχὰς 
ἀποκτείνοντες. Cain and Korah are 
said to have been objects of special 
reverence with a section of the Ophite 
heresy, which appears to have been a 
development of the Nicolaitans (Epi- 
phan. Pan. i. 3, 37, 1, οἵ ‘Opirar τὰς 
“προφάσεις εἰλήφασιν ἀπὸ τῆς Νικολάου 
καὶ Γνωστικῶν καὶ τῶν πρὸ τούτων 
αἱρέσεων). They held that the Creator 
was evil, that the serpent represented 
the divine Wisdom, that Cain and his 
successors were champions of right 
(Epiphan. ib. 38, 1, ot Καιανοί φασι τὸν 
Kaiv ἐκ τῆς ἰσχυροτέρας Δυνάμεως 
ὑπάρχειν καὶ τῆς ἄνωθεν αὐθεντίας, and 
boast themselves to be of kin to Cain, 
Kal τῶν Σοδόβξιτῶν καὶ Hoad καὶ Κορέ, 
see too Iren. i. 51. Clem. Str. vii. § 108.) 

τῇ πλάνῃ Tov Βαλαὰμ μισθοῦ ἐξεχύ- 
ϑησαν. Every word in this clause is 
open to question. The passive of ἐκχέω, 
to ‘pour out,” is used to express either 
the onward sweeping movement of a 
great crowd, or the surrender to an over- 
powering motive on the part of an in- 
dividual = effusi sunt,* as in Sit. xxxvii. 29, 
μὴ ἐκχυθῇς ἐπ᾽ ἐδεσμάτων; Test. Reub. 
I, πορνεία ἐν ἢ ἐξεχύθην, Clem. Al. Sér. 
ii. Ρ. 491, εἰς ἧδον τράγων δικήν, 
ἐκχυθέντες τς δ Soir, ΙΕ: ΤΣ 
Ant. 21, εἰς τὸν ἡδυπαθῆ καὶ ἀκόλαστον 
βίον ἐκκεχυμένος. Such an interpreta- 
tion seems not quite consistent with 
μισθοῦ, which implies cool self-interest. 
That covetousness, αἰσχροκέρδεια, was 
a common motive with false teachers 
is often implied or asserted by St. Paul 
and St. Peter in the passages quoted 
below : and this, we know, was the case 
with Balaam ; but would it be correct to 
say either of him or of his followers, here 
condemned by St. Jude, that they ran 
greedily into (or “ in’) error for reward ἢ 
Perhaps we should understand it rather 
of a headstrong will breaking down all 
obstacles, refusing to listen to reason or 
expostulation, as Balaam holds to his 
purpose in spite of the divine opposition 
manifested in such diverse ways. Then 


comes the difficulty, how are we to 
understand the dative πλάνῃ, and what 
is the reference in the word? Should 
we take πλάνῃ as equivalent to eis 
πλάνην (Winer, p. 268)? This is the 
interpretation given by Lucifer p. 210, 
“vae illis quoniam in seductionem B. 
mercede effusi sunt,’’ but it is a rare use 
of the dative, and it seems more natural 
to explain πλάνῃ by the preceding ὁδῷ 
(dative of the means or manner), which 
is used in the same collocation in 2 Peter 
ii. 15. What then are we to understand 
by ‘‘ they were hurried along on the line 
of Balaam’s error”? What was his 
error? From Num. xxii., xxv. 1-3, 
and xxxi. 16, Neh. xiii, 2, Μωαβῖται 
ἐμισθώσαντο ἐπ᾿ αὐτὸν τὸν Βαλαὰμ. 
καταράσασθαι, Jos. Ant. iv. 6, 6, we 
learn that B. was induced by Balak’s 
bribe to act against his own convictions 
and eventually to tempt Israel to fornica- 
tion. This then is the error or seduction 
by which he leads them astray.+ In rab- 
binical literature Balaam is a sort of type 
of false teachers (Pirke Aboth, v. 29, with 
Taylor's n.). Some suppose the name 
Nicolaitan (Apoc. ii. 6) to be formed 
from the Greek equivalent to Balaam 
= ‘‘corrupter of the people’; see how- 
ever the passages quoted from Clem. 
Al. in the Introduction on Early Heresies. 
In Apoc. ii. 14 we read of some in Per- 
gamum that held the teaching of Balaam, 
ὃς ἐδίδασκεν τῷ Βαλὰκ βαλεῖν σκάν- 
ϑαλον ἐνώπιον τῶν υἱῶν ᾿Ισραήλ, φαγεῖν 
εἰδωλόθυτα καὶ πορνεῦσαι. There is no 
hint to suggest that the innovators, of 
whom Jude speaks, favoured idolatry, 
but they may have prided themselves on 
their enlightenment in disregarding the 
tule of the Apostolic Council as to the 
use of meats offered to idols (cf. τ Cor. 
8), and perhaps in burning incense in 
honour of the Emperor, see Ramsay, 
Expositor for 1904, p. 409, and July, pp. 
43-60. On the other hand, Jude con- 
tinually charges them with moral laxity, 
and we may suppose that this was com- 
bined with claims to prophetic power, 
and with the covetousness which is often 
ascribed to the false teachers of the early 
Church, as in 1 Thess. ii. 3 f., where 


ἮΙ do not think the marginal reading in the R.V., “ cast themselves away,” is 


tenable. 


+ Zahn understands πλάνη in an active, not a passive sense, as the ruling prin- 
ciple of the πλάνος Balaam, not as the error into which others fell through his 


seductions. 
covers both. 


I do not think Jude discriminated between these meanings: πλάνη 


266 


καὶ TH ἀντιλογίᾳ τοῦ Κορὲ ἀπώλοντο. 


IOYAA ETI ΒΘΛΗ 


11- 


12. οὗτοί εἰσιν [οἱ] 


1 οντοι εἰσιν] add. (ex. v. 16) γογγυσται---πορενομενοι SY C2, 


Paul asserts of his own ministry that it 
Was οὐκ ἐκ πλάνης οὐδὲ ἐξ ἀκαθαρσίας 
οὐδὲ ἐν δόλῳ... αὔτε γὰρ ἐν λόγῳ 
κολακείας ἐγενήθημεν, οὔτε ἐν προφάσει 
πλεονεξίας, οὔτε ζητοῦντες ἐξ ἀνθρώπων 
δόξαν, τ Tim. iii. 8, 9, διακόνους μὴ 
διλόγους, μὴ οἴνῳ πολλῷ προσέχοντας, 
μὴ αἰσχροκερδεῖς, ἔχοντας τὸ μυστήριον 
τῆς πίστεως ἐν καθαρᾷ συνειδήσει, Tit. 
i. 7, 11 διδάσκοντες ἃ μὴ δεῖ κέρδους 
χάριν, τ Peter v. 2. For the gen. μισθοῦ 
cf. Winer, p. 258, Plat. Rep. ix. 575 B, 
μισϑοῦ ἐπικουροῦσιν, I Cor. vii. 23, τιμὴς 
ἠγοράσθητε. 

On the whole I understand the passage 
thus: Balaam went wrong because he 
allowed himself to hanker after gain and 
so lost his communion with God. He 
not only went wrong himself, but he 
abused his great influence and his repu- 
tation as a prophet, to lead astray the 
Israelites by drawing them away from 
the holy worship of Jehovah to the im- 
pure worship of Baal Peor. So these 
false teachers use their prophetical gifts 
for purposes of self-aggrandisement, and 
endeavour to make their services attrac- 
tive by excluding from religion all that 
is strenuous and difficult, and opening 
the door to every kind of indulgence. 
See the notes and comments on the 
parallel passages of 2 Peter in my edi- 
tion of that Epistle. 

τῇ ἀντιλογίᾳ τοῦ Κορὲ ἀπώλοντο. 
For Korah’s sin see Num. xvi. 1 f. and 
compare, for the same rebellious spirit 
in the Christian Church, 3 John, 9, 10 


(of Diotrephes), Tit. i. 10, 11, εἰσὶ 
πολλοὶ ἀνυπότακτοι. . . οὖς δεῖ 
ἐπιστομίζειν, ib. i. 16; ib. iii. 10, 1Ι, 


1 Tim. i. 20 (among those who have 
made shipwreck of the faith mention is 
made of Hymenaeus and Alexander) ots 
παρέδωκα τῷ Latava ἵνα παιδευθῶσιν 
μὴ βλασφημεῖν, 16. vi. 3-6, 2 Tim. ii. 16- 
18, ὁ λόγος αὐτῶν ὡς yayypatva νομὴν 
ἕξει, ὧν ἐστιν Ὑμέναιος καὶ Φίλητος, 
οἵτινες περὶ τὴν ἀλήθειαν ἠστόχησαν, 
ib, li. 25, iv. 14, where the opposition of 
Alexander the coppersmith is noted; but 
especially iii. 1-9, which presents a close 
parallel to our passage, referring to a 
similar resistance to Moses in the case 
of the apocryphal Jannes and Jambres. 
For ἀντιλογία see Heb. xii. 3, dvado- 
γίσασθε τὸν τοιαύτην ὑπομεμενηκότα ὑπὸ 
τῶν ἁμαρτωλῶν εἰς ἑαυτὸν ἀντιλογίαν. It 
is used as a translation of Meribah in 


Num. xx. 13 al. and (in relation to Korah) 
in Protev. Fac. 9. μνήσθητι ὅσα ἐποίησεν 
ὁ Θεὸς τοῖς Δαθάν, Κωρέ, καὶ ᾿Αβειράμ, 
πῶς ἐδιχάσθη ἡ γῆ καὶ κατέπιεν αὐτοὺς 
διὰ τὴν ἀντιλογίαν αὐτῶν. 

Rampf draws attention to the climax 
contained in these examples. The sin of 
Cain is marked by the words ἐπορεύ- 
θησαν ὁδῷ, that of Balaam the gentile 
prophet by ἐξεχύθησαν πλάνῃ; that of the 
Levite Korah by ἀπώλοντο ἀντιλογίᾳ. 

Ver. 12. οὗτοί εἰσιν [ot] ἐν ταῖς aya- 
Tats ὑμῶν omdddes συνευωχούμενοι. 
Dr. Chase quotes Zech. i. 10 f., Apoc. 
vii. 14, Enoch xlvi. 3, Secrets of Enoch, 
Vil. 3. XVili. 3, xix. 3, etc., for the phrase 
οὗτοί εἰσιν, adding that it was probably 
adopted by St. Jude from apocalyptic 
writings, for which he clearly had a 
special liking. On the early history of 
the Agape, see my Appendix C to Clem. 
Al. Strom. vii. The parallel passage in 
2 Peter (on which see n.) has two re- 
markable divergencies from the text 
here, reading ἀπάταις for ἀγάπαις and 
σπῖλοι for omdades. There has been 
much discussion as to the meaning of 
the latter word. It is agreed that it is 
generally used of a rock in or by the sea, 
and many of the lexicographers under- 
stand it of a hidden rock, ὕφαλος πέτρα, 
see Thomas Mag.; σπιλάς, ᾿Αττικῶς- 
ὕφαλος πέτρα, Ἕλληνες, Etymol. M., 
σπιλάδες. .. at ὑπὸ θάλασσαν κε- 
κρυμμέναι πέτραι, ὅθεν καὶ ὕφαλος 
ἄνθρωπος λέγεται ὁ κεκρυμμένος καὶ 
πανοῦργος, ib. κατασπιλάζοντες, κατα- 
κρύπτοντες, ἀπὸ μεταφορᾶς τῶν ὑφάλων 
πετρῶν, αἵτινες ὑπὸ ὕδατος καλυπ- 
τόμεναι τοῖς ἀπρούπτως προσπελάζουσι 
κίνδυνον ἐπιφέρουσι (both cited by 
Wetst.). The same explanation is given 
by the scholiast on Hom, Od. v. 401-405, 
καὶ δὴ δοῦπον ἄκουσε ποτὶ σπιλάδεσσι 
θαλάσσης ... ἀλλ᾽ ἀκταὶ προβλῆτες 
ἔσαν σπιλάδες τε πάγοι τε. See Plut. 
Mor. τοῖ Β, εὐδία σπιλάδος, which 
Wytt. translates ‘ ὕγαπα 5 maris 
caecam rupem tegentis,” tb. 476 A, 
Oecumenius on this passage, at σπιλάδες 
τοῖς πλέουσιν ὀλέθριοι, ἀπροσδοκήτως 
ἐπιγενόμεναι (?-vors), and ἐξαίφνης, 
ὥσπερ σπιλάδες, ἐπάγοντες αὐτοῖς τὸν 
ὄλεθρον τῶν ψυχῶν. Wetst. also quotes 
Heliod. ν. 31, θαλάσσῃ προσείκασας 
ἂν τοὺς ἄνδρας αἰφνιδίῳ σπιλάδι 
κατασεισθέντας. The compound κατα- 
σπιλάζω joined with the parallel case 


12. 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ENMIZTOAH 


267 


ἐν ταῖς! ἀγάπαις 2 ὑμῶν σπιλάδες, συνευωχούμενοι ἀφόβως," 


1 οι εν ταις] om. ot δῷ K vulg. Luc. Theophl. Oecon. +, Chase, 
2 qayamats $$ BKL syrr. sah. boh. + ; amwarats AC. 


3 ypwv] autwy A vulg. syrP +. 


4 συνευωχουμενοι, adoBws syrr., Treg., WH; συνενωχ. αφοβως, Ti. 


of ὕφαλος justifies, I think, this sense 
of σπιλάς, which is rejected by most of 
the later commentators.* ΟἿ. also the 
use of vavayéw in τ Tim. i. το. Scopulus 
is used in a similar metaphoric sense, 
see Οἷς. in Pis. 41 where Piso and 
Gabinius are called “ geminae voragines 
scopulique reipublicae”. Others take 
σπιλάδες in the very rare sense of 
“spots,” or “stains,” like σπίλοι in 
2 Peter. The only example of this sense 
seems to be in Orph. Lith. 614, but 
Hesych. gives the interpretation σπιλάς, 
μεμιασμένοι. I agree with Bp. Words- 
worth and Dr. Chase in thinking that 
the metaphor of the sunken rocks is more 
in harmony with the context. 

How are we to account for the gender 
in of... σπιλάδες συνευωχούμενοι ? 
Are we to suppose the gender of σπιλάς 
was changed or forgotten in late Greek 
(cf. Winer, pp. 25, 38, 73, 76)? If so, 
the forgetfulness seems to have been 
confined to this author. Or is this a 
constructio ad sensum, the feminine 
being changed to masculine because it 
is metaphorically used of men (Winer, 
pp. 171, 648, 660, 672), cf. Apoc. xi. 4, 
οὗτοί εἰσιν at δύο λυχνίαι αἱ ἐνώπιον 
τοῦ κυρίου ἑστῶτες and B’s reading 
παραφερόμενοι below? Or may we 
take σπιλάδες as expressing a comple- 
mentary notion in apposition to συνευ- 
wxovpevor? The last seems the best 
explanation though I cannot recall any 
exact parallel. An easier remedy would 
be to omit the article (with K and many 
versions), as suggested by Dr. Chase in 
Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible, ii. p. 
799), translating: ‘‘these are sunken 
rocks in your love-feasts while they feast 
with you”. 

συνενωχούμενοι. Is used in the parallel 
passage of 2 Peter with a dat. as in Luc. 
Philops 4, Jos. Ant. iv. 8, 7. 


ἀφόβως ἑαυτοὺς ποιμαίνοντες. If 
we take σπιλάδες as complementary to 
συνευωχούμενοι, it is better to take 
ἀφόβως with ποιμ-.: if we omit the 
article and take σπιλάδες to be the 
predicate, συνευωχούμενοι will be an 
epexegetic participle, which will require 
strengthening by ἀφόβως. Generally 
ἀφ. is used in a good sense, but we find 
it used, as here, of the want of a right 
fear in Prov. xix. 23, φόβος Κυρίου eis 
ζωὴν ἀνδρί, ὁ δὲ ἄφοβος κ.τιλ., 16. xv. 
τ6, κρεῖσσον μικρὰ μερὶς μετὰ φόβου 
Κυρίου ἢ θησαυροὶ μεγάλοι μετὰ ἀφ- 
οβίας, Sir. v. 5, περὶ ἐξιλασμοῦ μὴ 
ἄφοβος γίνου, προσθεῖναι ἁμαρτίαν ἐφ᾽ 
ἁμαρτίαις. The phrase ἑαυτοὺς ποιμ.- 
recalls Ezek. xxxiv. 8, ἐβόσκησαν οἱ 
ποιμένες ἑαυτοὺς, Ta δὲ πρόβατά pov 
οὐκ ἐβόσκησαν, but there does not seem 
to be any reference to spiritual pastors 
in Jude; and ποιμαίνω has probably 
here the sense “to fatten, indulge,” 
as in Prov. xxviii. 7, ὃς δὲ ποιμαίνει 
ἀσωτίαν, ἀτιμάζει πατέρα, ib. xxix. 3, 
ὃς δὲ ποιμαίνει πόρνας, ἀπολεῖ πλοῦτον, 
Plut. Mor. 792 Β, Ἄτταλον ὑπ᾽ ἀργίαᾳ 
μακρᾶς ἐκλυθέντα κομιδῇ Φιλοποίμην 
ἐποίμαινεν ἀτεχνῶς πιαινόμενον. We 
may compare I Cor. xi. 27 f., James ν. 5, 
1 Tim. v. 6. 

νεφέλαι ἄνυδροι ὑπὸ ἀνέμων mapa 
φερόμεναι. The character of the inno- 
vators is illustrated by figures drawn 
from the four elements, air, earth, sea, 
heaven (αἰθήρ). Spitta points out the 
resemblance to a passage in Enoch 
(chapters ii.-v.), which follows imme- 
diately on the words quoted below, vv. 
14, τς. The regular order of nature is 
there contrasted with the disorder and 
lawlessness of sinners. “1 observed 
everything that took place in the heaven, 
how the luminaries . . . do not de- 
viate from their orbits, how they all 


* Dr. Bigg denies this meaning on the strength mainly of two quotations, Hom. 
Od. iii. 298, ἀτὰρ νῆάς ye ποτὶ σπιλάδεσσιν ἔαξαν κύματα, where, he says, the 
σπιλάδες are identical with λισσὴ αἰπεῖά τε cis ἅλα πέτρη Of 293; and Anthol. 
xi. 390, φασὶ δὲ καὶ νήεσσιν ἁλιπλανέεσσι χερείους Tas ὑφάλους πέτρας τῶν 


φανερῶν σπιλάδων. 


In both of these I think the word refers to the breakers at 


the bottom of the cliffs: in the latter it is said that hidden rocks are more danger- 


ous than visible ree/s. 


Compare Diod. iii. 43, ὄρος δὲ ταύτῃ παράκειται κατὰ μὲν 


A ‘ , > , e 4 x - i= 4 , < ‘ A ‘ 
THY κορυφὴν πέτρας ἀποτομάδας ἔχον καὶ τοῖς ὕψεσι καταπληκτικάς, ὑπὸ δὲ τὰς 
ῥίζας σπιλάδας ὀξείας καὶ πυκνὰς ἐνθαλάττους. 


268 


ἑαυτοὺς ποιμαίνοντες, νεφέλαι ἄνυδροι ὑπὸ ἀνέμων παραφερόμεναι, 


IOYAA ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


Zz 


1 


l rapadepopevor B. 


rise and set in order, each in its sea- 
son, and transgress not against their 
appointed order. I observed and 
saw how in winter all the trees seem as 
though they were withered and shed all 
their leaves. . . . And again I observed 
the days of summer . . . how the trees 
cover themselves with green leaves and 
bear fruit. ... And behold how the 
seas and the rivers accomplish their task. 
But as for you, ye have not continued 
steadfast; and the law of the Lord ye 
have not fulfilled ...and have slan- 
derously spoken proud and hard words 
(below ver. 15, περὶ πάντων τῶν σκληρῶν 
ὧν ἐλάλησαν κατ᾽ αὐτοῦ) with your im- 
pure mouths against his greatness.” 
For the metaphor cf. Eph. iv. 14. In 
the parallel passage of 2 Peter the first 
figure is broken into two, πηγαὶ ἄνυδροι, 
ὁμίχλαι 4 ὑπὸ λαίλαπος ἐλαυνόμεναι. Per- 
haps the writer may have thought that 
there was an undue multiplication of 
causes; if the clouds were waterless, 
it was needless to add that they were 
driven past by the wind. We find the 
same eomparison in Prov. xxv. 14: ‘‘ As 
clouds and wind without rain, so is he 
that boasteth himself of his gifts falsely ” 
[The LXX is less like our text, suggest- 
ing that Jude was acquainted with the 
original Hebrew. C.] For the use of 
ὑπό with ἀνέμων see my note on James 
iii. 4. 
δένδρα φθινοπωρινὰ ἄκαρπα. φθινο- 
πωρινός is an adjective derived from 
τὸ φθινόπωρον, which is itself, I think, 
best explained as a compound of 
φθίνουσα ὀπώρα (cf. φθίνοντος μηνός), 
meaning the concluding portion of the 
ὀπώρα. This latter word is, according to 
Curtius, compounded of ὁπ-» connected 
with ὀπίσω, ὄπισθεν, and ὥρα = tae 
later prime’. We find ὥρα used by 
itself both for the spring with its flowers 
and, more rarely, for the summer with 
its fruits, as in Thuc. ii. 52, Spa ἔτους. 
Perhaps from this double use of the word 
may have come the ambiguity in the 
application of ὀπώρα, of which Ideler 
says that ‘it originally indicated, not a 
season separate from and following after 
the summer, but the hottest part of the 
summer itself, so that Sirius, whose 
heliacal rising took place (in the age of 
Homer) about the middle of July, is 
described as ἀστὴρ ὀπωρινός Il. v. 5). 
In early times it would seem that 


the Greeks, like the Germans (Tac. 
Germ. 26), recognised only three sea- 
sons—winter, spring, summer, and 
that the last was indifferently named 
θέρος ο᾽ ὀπώρα: compare Arist. 
Aves 709, πρῶτα μὲν ὥρας φαίνομεν 
ἡμεῖς ἦρος, χειμῶνος, ὀπώρας, with 
Aesch, Prom. 453, ἦν δ᾽ οὐδὲν αὐτοῖς 
οὔτε χείματος τέκμαρ οὔτ᾽ ἀνθεμώδους 
ἦρος οὔτε καρπίμου θέρους βέβαιον. 
But though ὀπώρα was thus used strictly 
for the dog-days, when the fruit ripened, 
it was also vaguely used for the unnamed 
period which ensued up to the com- 
mencement of winter. Thus Hesiod 
(Op. 674) μηδὲ μένειν οἷνόν τε νέον καὶ 
ὀπωρινὸν 3 Kal χειμῶν᾽ ἐπιόντα : 
and ὀπώρα appears as a definite season 
by the side of the others in a line of 
Euripides, qnoted by Plutarch (Mor. 
1028 F), from which it appears that he 
assigned four months each to summer 
and winter, and two to spring and 
ὀπώρα :— 


φίλης τ᾽ ὀπώρας διπτύχους ἦρος τ᾽ 
ἴσους 


(where the epithet φίλης deserves notice). 
It is said that the author of the treatise 
De Diaeta (c. 420 B.c.), which goes 
under the name of Hippocrates, was 
the first to introduce a definite term 
(φθινόπωρον or μετόπωρον) for the new 
season, the word ὀπώρα being reserved 
for the late summer, according to the 
definition of Eustath, on 1]. ν. 5, ὀπώρα 
ὥρα μεταξὺ κειμένη θέρους καὶ τοῦ μετ᾽ 
αὐτὴν μετοπώρου. And so we find it 
used by Aristotle (Meteor. 1.0/5), Ge 
χάλαζαι γίνονται ἔαρος μὲν. καὶ μετο- 
πώρου μάλιστα, εἶτα καὶ τῆς ὀπώρας, 
χειμῶνος δὲ ὀλιγάκις, and by Theo- 
phrastus (περὶ Σημείων, 44), ἐὰν τὸ ἔαρ 
καὶ τὸ θέρος ψυχρὰ γίνηται, ἣ ὀπώρα 
γίνεται καὶ τὸ μετόπωρον πνιγηρόν. 
There is a good deal of inconsistency 
about the exact limits of the seasons, as 
is natural enough when we remember 
that they were first distinguished for pur- 
poses of agriculture and navigation, as 
we see in Hesiod’s Works and Days. 
Each season brings its own proper work, 
and the farmer or merchant is reminded 
of the return of the season by various 
signs, the rising and setting of stars, 
especially of the Pleiades and Arcturus, 
the sun’s passage through the signs of 


13. [OYAA ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


260 


δένδρα φθινοπωρινὰ ἄκαρπα δὶς ἀποθανόντα ἐκριζωθέντα, 13. κύμ- 


» , > , x ς a 3 , > ΄ 
aTa ἄγρια θαλάσσης ἐπαφρίΐζοντα TAS εαυτῶν αἰσχύνας, ἀστέρες 


the zodiac, the reappearance of the birds, 
etc. A more strictly accurate division 
was made by the astronomers, who dis- 
tinguished between the various kinds of 
rising and setting of the stars, and 
divided the year into four equal parts by 
the solstices and equinoxes. In the year 
46 B.c. Julius Caesar introduced his re- 
vised calendar, which assigned definite 
dates to the different seasons. Thus 
spring begins a.d. vii. id. Feb. (Feb. 7), 
summer a.d. vii. id. Mai. (May 9), 
autumn a.d. tit. id. Sext. (Aug. 11), 
winter a.d, iv. id. Nov. (Nov. 10). 

To turn now to the commentators, I 
may take Trench as representing their 
view in his Authorised Version, p. 186, 
ed. 2, where he says, “‘ The φθινόπωρον 
is the late autumn . . . which succeeds 
the ὀπώρα (or the autumn contemplated 
as the time of the ripened fruits of the 
earth) and which has its name παρὰ τὸ 
φθίνεσθαι τὴν ὀπώραν, from the waning 
away of the autumn and the autumn 
fruits. ... The deceivers of whom St. 
Jude speaks are likened to treés as they 
show in late autumn, when foliage and 
fruit alike are gone.” ; 

I have stated above what I hold to 
be the origin of the word φθινόπωρον. 
Trench’s explanation is ambiguous and 
unsuited to the facts of the case, as will 
be seen from the criticisms in Lightfoot’s 
Fresh Revision, p. 135: ‘‘In the phrase 
‘autumn-trees without fruit’ there ap- 
pears to be a reference to the parable of 
the fig-tree. . . . At all events the men- 
tion of the season when fruit might be 
expected is significant.” He adds in a 
note, ‘‘ Strange to say, the earliest ver- 
sions all rendered φθινοπωρινά correctly.* 
Tyndale’s instinct led him to give what I 
cannot but think the right turn to the 
expression, ‘Trees with out frute at 
gadringe (gathering) time,’ i.e. at the 
season when fruit was looked for. I 
cannot agree with Archbishop Trench, 
who maintains that ‘ Tyndale was feel- 
ing after, though he has not grasped, the 
right translation,’ and himself explains 
φθινοπωρινὰ ἄκαρπα as ‘ mutually com- 
pleting one another, without leaves, with- 
out fruit’. Tyndale was followed by 
‘Coverdale and the Great Bible. Simi- 
larly Wycliffe has ‘ hervest trees with- 


* This agreement is probably owing to 
auctumnales infructuosae’’. 


out fruyt,’ and the Rheims version 
‘trees of autumne unfruiteful’. The 
earliest offender is the Geneva Testa- 
ment, which gives ‘corrupt trees and 
without frute’. . . . The Bishops’ Bible 
strangely combines both renderings, 
‘trees withered (φθίνειν) at fruite 
gathering (ὀπώρα) and without fruite,’ 
which is explained in the margin, ‘ Trees 
withered in autumne when the fruite har- 
vest is, and so the Greke woord im- 
porteth ’. "ἢ 

The correctness of the interpretation, 
given by Lightfoot alone among modern 
commentators, is confirmed by a con- 
sideration of the context. The writer has 
just been comparing the innovators, who 
have crept into other Churches, to water- 
less clouds driven past by the wind. Just 
as these disappoint the hope of the hus- 
bandman, so do fruitless trees in the 
proper season of fruit. If φθινοπωρινά 
were equivalent to χειμερινά, denoting 
the season when the trees are necessarily 
bare both of leaves and fruit, how could 
a tree be blamed for being ἄκαρπον ἢ It 
is because it might have been, and ought 
to have been a truit-bearing tree, that it 
is rooted up. 

Sis ἀποθανόντα ἐκριζωθεντα. Schneck- 
enburger explains, ‘‘ He who is not born 
again is dead in his sins (Col. ii. 13), he 
who has apostatised is twice dead,” cf. 
Apoc. xxi. 8, Heb. vi. 4-8, 2 Peter ii. 20- 
22. So the trees may be called doubly 
dead, when they are not only sapless, but 
are torn up by the root, which would have 
caused the death even of a living tree. 

Ver. 13. κύματα ἄγρια θαλάσσης 
ἐπαφρίζοντα τὰς ἑαυτῶν αἰσχύνας. Cf. 
Cic. Ad Herenn. iv. 55, spumans ex ore 
scelus. The two former illustrations, 
the reefs and the clouds, refer to the 
specious professions of the libertines and 
the mischief they caused ; the third, the 
dead trees, brings out also their own miser- 
able condition; the fourth and fifth give a 
very fine description of their lawlessness 
and shamelessness, and their eventual 
fate. The phrase ἄγρια κύματα is found 
in Wisdom xiv. 1. The rare word éra- 
φρίζω is used of the sea in Moschus ν. 5. 
It refers to the seaweed and other refuse 
horne on the crest of the waves and 
thrown up on the beach, to which are 


their dependence on the Vulgate “‘ arbores 


270 


πλανῆται ots ὁ ζόφος τοῦ σκότους εἰς αἰῶνα τετήρηται. 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ἘΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


i 


14. 


᾿Επροφήτευσεν 2 δὲ καὶ τούτοις ἕβδομος ἀπὸ ᾿Αδὰμ Ἑνὼχ λέγων 


1 πλανητες ors ζοφος σκοτους Β. 
2 ἐπροφητευσεν Β'; επροεφ. Β5; 


compared the overflowings of ungodli- 
ness (Ps. xvii. 4), the ῥυπαρία καὶ πε- 
ρισσεία κακίας condemned by James i. 
21, where see my note. The libertines 
foam out their own shames by their 
swelling words (ver. 16), while they turn 
the grace of God into a cloak for their 
licentiousness (ver. 4). We may com- 
pare Phil. iii. 19, ἡ δόξα ἐν τῇ αἰσχύνῃ 
αὐτῶν. 

ἀστέρες πλανῆται. This is borrowed 
‘from Enoch (chapters xliii., xliv.) where 
it is said that some of the stars become 
lightnings and cannot part with their new 
form, ib. 80, ‘In the days of the sinners, 
many chiefs of the stars will err, and will 
alter their orbits and tasks, ib. 86, where 
the fall of the angels is described as the 
falling of stars, ἐδ. 88, ‘‘he seized the 
first star which had fallen from heaven 
and bound it in an abyss; now that 
abyss was narrow and deep and horrible 
and dark. . . and they took all the great 
stars and bound them hand and foot, 
and laid them in an abyss,” ib. xc. 24, 
‘and judgment was held first upon the 
Stars, and they were judged and found 
guilty and were cast into an abyss of 
fire’’; also xviii. 14 ἔν 

It would seem from these passages, 
which Jude certainly had before him, 
that πλανῆται cannot here have its usual 
application, the propriety of which was 
repudiated by all the ancient astronomers 
from Plato downwards. Cf. Cic. N. D. 
ii. 51, ‘‘maxime sunt admirabiles motus 
earum quinque stellarum quae falso vo- 
cantur errantes. Nihil enim errat quod 
in omni aeternitate conservat motus con- 
stantes et ratos,’’ with the passages 
quoted in my notes on that book. 

Some commentators take it as applying 
to comets; perhaps the quotations from 
Enoch 44 and 8o fit better with shooting- 
stars, ἀστέρες διάττοντες (Arist. Meteor. 
i. 4, 7) which seem to rush from their 
sphere into darkness; compare Hermes 
Trismegistus ap. Stob. Ecl. i. 478, κάτω- 
θεν τῆς σελήνης εἰσὶν ἕτεροι ἀστέρες 
φθαρτοὶ ἀργοὶ... ods καὶ ἡμεῖς ὁρῶμεν 
διαλυομένους, τὴν φύσιν ὁμοίαν ἔχοντες 
τοῖς ἀχρήστοις τῶν ἐπὶ γῆς ζῴων, ἐπὶ 
ἕτερον δὲ οὐδὲν γίγνεται ἢ ἵνα μόνον 
φθαρῇ. For the close relationship sup- 
posed by the Jews to exist between the 


προεπροφ. $9; προεφ. ACKL al. 


stars and the angels, see my noteon James 
i. 17, φώτων. In this passage, however, 
the subject of the comparison is men, who 
profess to give light and guidance, as the 
pole-star does to mariners (ὡς φωστῆρες. 
ἐν κόσμῳ, Phil. ii. 15), but who are 
only blind leaders of the blind, centres 
and propagators of πλάνη (ver. 11), des- 
tined to be swallowed up in everlasting 
darkness. Cf. Apoc. vi. 13, viii. 10, 12, 
extends 

ots ὁ ζόφος τοῦ σκότους εἰς αἰῶνα 
τετήρηται. See the parallel in 2 Pet. ii. 
17, and above ver. 6. 

Vv. 14-16.—The Prophecy of Enoch, 
The ancient prophecy, to which reference 
has been already made, was intended for 
these men as well as for the prophet’s 
own contemporaries, where he says “‘ The 
Lord appeared, encompassed by myriads 
of his holy ones, to execute justice upon 
all and to convict all the ungodly con- 
cerning all their ungodly works, and con- 
cerning all the hard things spoken against 
Him by ungodly sinners”. (Like them)- 
these men are murmurers, complaining 
of their lot, slaves to their own carnal 
lusts, while they utter presumptuous. 
words against God, and seek to ingratiate 
themselves with men for the sake of gain. 

Ver. 14. ἐπροφήτευσεν δὲ καὶ τούτοις. 
ἕβδομος ἀπὸ ᾿Αδὰμ Ἑνώχ. “It was for 
these also (as well as for his own con- 
temporaries) that the prophecy of Enoch 
was intended, far as he is removed from 
our time, being actually the sixth (by 
Hebrew calculation, seventh) descendant 
from Adam.” For Enoch compare the 
allusions in Sir. xliv. 16, xlix. 14, Heb. xi. 
5, Charles, Introduction to Book of Enoch. 
The prophecy is contained in En. i. 9 
(Greek in Charles, App. C. p. 327), ὅτι 
ἔρχεται σὺν τοῖς (ἢ ταῖθ) μυριάσιν 
αὐτοῦ καὶ τοῖς ἁγίοις αὐτοῦ 
ποιῆσαι κρίσιν κατα πάντων, 


Ἢ > , x > ~ .. 
Kat ἀπολέσει τοὺς ἀσεβεῖς καὶ 
ἐλέγξει πᾶσαν σάρκα περὶ. 
πάντων «τῶν» ἔργων αὐτῶν 


ὧν ἠσέβησαν κατ᾽ αὐτοῦ ἃἂμ- 
αρτωλοὶ ἀσεβεῖς. The phrase ἕβ- 
δομος ἀπὸ ᾿Αδάμ is also found in En. Ix. 
8, ‘‘My grandfather was taken up, the 
seventh from Adam,” 2b. xciii. 3, ‘* And 
Enoch began to recount from the books 
and spake: I was born the seventh in the 


16, 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ΒΠΙΣΊΤΟΛΗ 


271 


᾿Ιδοὺ ἦλθεν Κύριος ἐν ἁγίαις μυριάσιν 1 αὐτοῦ, 15. ποιῆσαι κρίσιν 
κατὰ πάντων καὶ ἐλέγξαι πάντας τοὺς ἀσεβεῖς: περὶ πάντων τῶν 
ΒΩ , Ἀπ me > , ‘ Ν lad - 4 
ἔργων ἀσεβείας αὐτῶν ὃ ὧν ἠσέβησαν καὶ περὶ πάντων τῶν σκληρῶν 


ὧν ἐλάλησαν κατ᾽ αὐτοῦ ἁμαρτωλοὶ ἀσεβεῖς. 


’ 
16. Οὗτοί εἰσιν 


᾿αγιαις μυριασιν] μυριασιν αγιων ἀγγέλων SY SyrP. sah. arm. +. 
2 παντας τους ασεβεις) add. αὐτων KL, Ti. (incuria?); πασαν ψυχὴν δῷ, 50}, 


sah. 


3 ἀσεβειας avtwy] om. δῷ sah. + ; [ασεβειας] avtwy Treg. 


4 σκληρων] add. Aoywv NC, Ti. 


first week, while judgment and righteous- 
ness still tarried; and after me there will 
arise in the second week great wicked- 
ness,’’ where Charles refers to ¥ubilees, 
7. The genealozical order, as given in 
Gen. v. 4-20, is (1) Adam, (2) Seth, (3) 
Enos, (4) Cainan, (5) Mahalaleel, (6) 
Jared, (7) Enoch. It is probably the 
sacredness of the number 7 which led 
the Jewish writers to lay stress upon it 
in Enoch s case. 

ἰδοὺ ἦλθεν Κύριος ἐν ἁγίαις μυριάσιν 
αὐτοῦ. Charles’ translation from the 
Aethiopic is ‘And lo! He comes with 
ten thousands of his holy ones to exe- 
cute judgment upon them, and He will 
destroy the ungodly and will convict all 
flesh of all that the sinners and ungodly 
have wrought and ungodly committed 
against Him”’. For μυριάσιν ἀγγέλων 
cf. Heb. xii. 22, Ps. Ixviti. 17, Deut. xxxiii. 
2. For the use of ἐν denoting accom- 
panying circumstances see Blass, Gr. 
N. T. tr. p. 118, and Luke xiv. 31, εἰ 
δυνατός ἐστιν ἐν δέκα χιλιάσιν ἀπαντῆ- 
σαι τῷ μετὰ εἴκοσι χιλιάδων ἐρχομένῳ 
ἐπ᾽ αὐτόν. The aorist here is the pre- 
terite of prophetic vision, as when Mi- 
caiah says, ‘‘I saw all Israel scattered,” 
cf. Apoc. x. 7, xiv. 8. 

Ver. 15. ποιῆσαι κρίσιν κατὰ πάντων. 
Follows exactly the Greek translation of 
Enoch given above, cf. Ael. V. H. ii. 6, 
Κρίτων ἔπειθεν αὐτὸν ἀποδρᾶναι καὶ τὴν 
κατ᾽ αὐτοῦ κρίσιν διαφθεῖραι. On the 
distinction between the active ποιεῖν 
κρίσιν “to execute judgment” (as in 
John v. 27) and the periphrastic middle 
Ξε κρίνειν (as in Isocr. 48 p) see my notes 
on αἰτεῖν and αἰτεῖσϑαι, ἴδε and ἰδού 
(James iv. 3, 16. iii. 3). 

ἐλέγξαι πάντας τοὺς ἀσεβεῖς περὶ 
πάντων τῶν ἔργων ἀσεβείας αὐτῶν ὧν 
ἠσέβησαν. Shortened from the Greek 
Enoch quoted above. 

ἀσεβεῖς. Cf. vv. 4, 18. The word 
thrice repeated in this verse runs through 
the epistle as a sort of refrain. 


περὶ πάντων τῶν σκληρῶν ὧν ἐλάλησαν. 
This is taken from Enoch xxvii. 2. 
Charles, p. 366 (To Gehenna shall come), 
πάντες οἵτινες ἐροῦσιν τῷ στόματι αὐτῶν 
κατὰ Κυρίου φωνὴν ἀπρεπῆ καὶ περὶ τῆς 
δόξης αὐτοῦ σκληρὰ λαλήσουσιν, cf. id. 
v. 4, ‘* The law of the Lord ye have not 
fulfilled, but . .. have  slanderously 
spoken proud and hard words with your 
impure mouths against His greatness,”’ 
ib. ci. 3, al., Gen. xlii. 7, ἐχάλησεν αὐτοῖς 
σκληρά, τ Kings xii. 13, ἀπεκρίθη πρὸς 
τὸν λαὸν σκληρά, Mal. iii. 13-15. 

Ver. 16. οὗτοί εἰσιν γογγυσταί, pep- 
ψίμοιροι. Charles thinks that we have 
here another case of borrowing from the 
Assumption of Moses, see his Introd. on 
Apocryphal Quotations. The word yoy- 
γυστής is used in the LXX, Exod xvi. 8, 
Num. xi. I, 14-27, 29. The verb yoy- 
γύζω is found in John vii. 32 of the whis- 
pering of the multitude in favour of Jesus, 
but is generally used of smouldering dis- 
content which people are afraid to speak 
out, as in r Cor. x. 10, of the murmurings 
of the Israelites in the wilderness; Matt. 
xx. II (where see Wetst.) of the grum- 
bling of the labourers who saw others 
receiving a day’s pay for an hour’s 
labour; John vi. 41-43 of the Jews who 
took offence at the preaching of the 
Bread of Life. It is found in Epict. and 
M. Aur. but not in classical authors. 
γογγυσμός is used in τ Peteriv.g. See 
further in Phrynichus, p. 358 Lob. For 
the word μεμψίμοιρος see Lucian, Cynic. 
17, ὑμεῖς δὲ διὰ THY εὐδαιμονίαν οὐδενὶ 
τῶν γιγνομένων ἀρέσκεσθε, καὶ παντὶ 
μέμφεσθε, καὶ τὰ μὲν παρόντα φέρειν οὐκ 
ἐθέλετε, τῶν δὲ ἀπόντων ἐφίεσθε, χειμῶ- 
γος μὲν θέρος εὐχόμενοι, θέρους δὲ χει- 
μῶνα . καθάπερ οἱ γοσοῦντες, 
δυσάρεστοι καὶ μεμψίμοιροι ὄντες, and 
Theophr. Char. 17. It is used of the 
murmuring of the Israelites by Philo, 
Vit. Mos. 1. 109 M. See other examp'es 
in Wetst. The same spirit is condemned 
in James i. 13. 


ΙΟΥΔΑ EMISTOAH 


16— 


γογγυσταί, μεμψίμοιροι, κατὰ τὰς ἐπιθυμίας αὐτῶν πορευόμενοι, 


~ a ΄ 
καὶ τὸ στόμα αὐτῶν λαλεῖ ὑπέρογκα, θαυμάζοντες πρόσωπα ὠφελίας 


χάριν. 


ε “ via as , , ; A ε , ral , 
17. Ὑμεῖς δέ, ἀγαπητοί, μνήσθητε τῶν ῥημάτων τῶν προειρημέ- 
νων ὑπὸ τῶν ἀποστόλων τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ ᾿ 18. ὅτι 


κατὰ τὰς ἐπιθυμίας αὐτῶν πορευόμενοι. 
Cf. 2 Pet. iii. 3 and ii. τὸ, below ver. 
18, and see my notes on James iv. 1, 2. 
Plumptre notes ‘‘ The temper of self- 
indulgence recognising not God’s will, 
but man’s desires, as the law of action, 
is precisely that which issues in weariness 
and despair . . cf. Eccles. ii. 1-20”’. 

τὸ στόμα αὐτῶν λαλεῖ ὑπέρογκα. See 
Enoch ν. 4, quoted on ver. 15, also Enoch 
ci. 3, γε have spoken insolent words 
against His righteousness,’’ Ps. xii. 4, 
Ps. Ixxiii. 8, Dan. vii. 8, στόμα λαλοῦν 
μεγάλα and ver. 20 of the little horn; 
compare above vv. 4, 8, 11, and James 
iii, 5 foll. In classical writers ὑπέρογκα 
is generally used of great or even exces- 
Sive size, in later writers it is also used of 
“‘big’’ words, arrogant speech and de- 
meanour, see Alford’s note on 2 Pet. ii. 
18 and Plut. Mor. 1119 B (Socrates), τὴν 
ἐμβροντησίαν ἐκ τοῦ βίου καὶ τὸν τῦφον 
ἐξήλαυνε καὶ τὰς ἐπαχθεῖς καὶ ὑπερόγ- 
KOUS κατοιήσεις καὶ μεγαλαυχίας, 10. 
7 A, where 4 θεατρικὴ καὶ παρατράγῳδος 
λέξις is styled ὑπέρογκος in contrast with 
ἰσχνὴ λέξις, Plut. Vitae 505 B, τοῦ 
βασιλέως τὸ φρόνημα τραγικὸν καὶ ὑπέρ- 
ογκον ἐν ταῖς μεγάλαις εὐτυχίαις 
ἐγεγόνει. It is found in 2 Peter ii. 18 
and in Dan. xi. 36, ὁ βασιλεὺς ὑψωθήσε- 
ται kat μεγαλυνθήσεται ἐπὶ πάντα θεόν, 
καὶ λαλήσει ὑπέρογκα. 

θαυμάζοντες πρόσωπα ὠφελίας χάριν. 
The phrase occurs with the same force 
in Lev. xix. 15, οὐ μὴ θαυμάσῃς πρόσω- 
πον, Job xiii. το, see my note on James ii. 
I, μὴ ἐν προσωπολημψίαις ἔχετε τὴν 
πίστιν τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰ. X., and cf. τ 
Tim. iii. 8, quoted above on ver. 11. 
As the fear of God drives out the 
fear of man, so defiance of God tends 
‘to put man in His place, as the chief 
source of good or evil to his fellows. For 
the anacoluthon (τὸ στόμα αὐτῶν λαλεῖ 
--θαυμάζοντες) compare Col. ii. 2, ἵνα 
παρακληθῶσιν αἱ καρδίαι ὑμῶν συμβι- 
βασϑέντες ἐν εἰρήνῃ, where a similar peri- 
phrasis (at καρδίαι ὑμῶν -- ὑμεῖς) is 
followed by a constructio ad sensum, also 
Winer, p. 716. Perhaps the intrusion of 
the finite clause into a participial series 
may be accounted for by a reminiscence 
of Ps. xvil. 10,76 στόμα αὐτῶν ἐλάλησεν 


ὑπερηφανίαν, or Ps, cxliv. 8, 11, where a 
similar phrase occurs. 

Vv. 17-19.—The Faithful are bidden 
to call to mind the warnings of the 
Apostles. The Apostles warned you re- 
peatedly that in the last time there would 
arise mockers led away by their own car- 
nal lusts. It is these that are now break- 
ing up the unity of the Church by their 
invidious distinctions, men of unsancti- 
fied minds, who have not the Spirit of 
God. See Introduction on the Early 
Heresies in the larger edition. 

Ver. 17. ὑμεῖς δὲ, ἀγαπητοί, μνήσθητε 
τῶν ῥημάτων τῶν προειρημένων ὑπὸ τῶν 
ἀποστόλων. The writer turns again, as 
in ver. 20 below, to the faithful members 
of the Church (ver. 3) and reminds them, 
not now of primeval prophecy, but of 
warning words uttered by the Apostles. 
Some have taken this as a quotation by 
Jude from 2 Peter iii. 3, where the quota- 
tion is given more fully. But, there also, 
the words are referred back to a prior 
authority, ‘‘holy prophets” and ‘‘ your 
Apostles’. The words ὅτι ἔλεγον ὑμῖν, 
which follow, imply that the warning was 
spoken, not written, and that it was 
ofter? repeated. 

Ver. 18. ἐπ᾽ ἐσχάτου χρόνου ἔσονται 
ἐμπαῖκται. The parallel in 2 Peter iii. 3 
is ἐλεύσονται ἐπ᾽ ἐσχάτων τῶν ἡμερῶν ἐν 
ἐμπαιγμονῇ ἐμπαῖκται, where see note on 
the use of the article with ἔσχατος, etc. 
For ἐπί, cf. Arist. Pol. iv. 3, ἐπὶ τῶν 
ἀρχαίων χρόνων. 

The prophecy of this mocking, as a 
mark of the future trials of the Church, 
has not come down to us. An example 
of it in the very beginning of the Church 
is given in Acts ii. 13, ἕτεροι χλευάζοντες 
ἔλεγον ὅτι γλεύκους μεμεστωμένοι εἰσί. 
In the O.T. we have such examples as 2 
Chron. xxxvi. 16 (the summing up of the 
attitude of the Jews towards the prophets) 
ἦσαν μυκτηρίζοντες τοὺς ἀγγέλους αὐτοῦ 
καὶ ἐξουθενοῦντες τοὺς λόγους αὐτοῦ καὶ 
ἐμπαίζοντες ἐν τοῖς προφήταις αὐτοῦ, 
Jer. xx. 8, ἐγενήθη λόγος Κυρίου εἰς ὀνει- 
δισμὸν ἐμοὶ καὶ εἰς χλευασμὸν πᾶσαν 
ἡμέραν. Cf. also the mockery at the 
crucifixion, and the declaration in Matt. 
x. 25 f., εἰ τὸν οἰκοδεσπότην Βεεζέβοὺλ 
ἐπεκάλεσαν, πόσῳ μᾶλλον «.t.A. In 2 


19. 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ἘΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 27 


ies) 


ἔλεγον ὑμῖν En ἐσχάτου 1 Χρόνου 3 ἔσονται 5 ἐμπαῖκται κατὰ τὰς 
ἑαυτῶν ἐπιθυμίας πορευόμενοι τῶν ἀσεβειῶν. 10. Οὗτοί εἰσιν ol 


ἀποδιορίζοντες," ψυχικοί, πνεῦμα μὴ ἔχοντες. 


len’ ἐσχατου YB; ott en” eax. AC; [ott] em” ἐσχ-: Treg.; ὅτι εν ἐσχατῳ KL 


P vulg. sah. 


ὥχρονου BC; του xpovov WA; xpovw KL; tw xpovw P sah.; των χρονων boh. 


al. 


ϑέεσονται SBCKLP; ελευσονται $9?AC?, sah. boh. 
ὅτων ασεβειων) οπισω ἀσεβειων syrh; οπισω αἀσεβειας syrP. 


5 αποδιοριζοντες) add. εαυτους C vulg. 


Peter the purport of this mockery is ex- 
plained to be the unfulfilled promise of 
the Parusia. Here we must gather its 
meaning from the account already given 
of the libertines. If they turned the 
grace of God into licentiousness, they 
would naturally mock at the narrowness 
and want of enlightenment of those who 
took a strict and literal view of the divine 
commandments: if they made light of 
authority and treated spiritual things 
with irreverence, if they foamed out their 
own shame and uttered proud and im- 
pious words, if they denied God and 
Christ, they would naturally laugh at the 
idea of a judgment to come. On the 
form ἐμπαίκτης and its cognates, see note 
on 2 Peter. 

τῶν ἀσεβειῶν. I am rather disposed 
to take τῶν ἀσεβειῶν here as a subjective 
genitive, ‘‘lusts belonging to, or arising 
from their impieties,’” cf. Rom. i. 28, 
καθὼς οὐκ ἐδοκίμασαν τὸν Θεὸν ἔχειν 
ἐν ἐπιγνώσει, παρέδωκεν αὐτοὺς ὁ Θεὸς 
εἰς ἀδόκιμον νοῦν. The position of the 
genitive is peculiar, and probably intended 
to give additional stress. We may com- 
pare it with James ii. 1, μὴ ἐν προσωπο- 
λημψίαις ἔχετε τὴν πίστιν τοῦ κυρίου 
ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, τῆς δόξης, where 
some connect τῆς δόξης with κυρίου in a 
qualitative sense. 

Ver. 19. οὗτοί εἰσιν οἱ ἀποδιορίζοντες. 
‘*These are they that make invidious 
distinctions.” See Introduction on the 
Text. The rare word ἀποδιορίζοντες is 
used of logical distinctions in Aristotle, 
Pol. iv. 43, ὥσπερ οὖν εἰ ζῴου προῃ- 
ρούμεθα λαβεῖν εἴδη, πρῶτον ἂν ἀποδιω- 
ρίζομεν ὅπερ ἀναγκαῖον πᾶν ἔχειν ζῷον 
(‘‘as, if we wished to make a classifica- 
tion of animals, we should have begun by 
setting aside that which all animals have 
in common’’) and, I believe, in every 
other passage in which it is known to 
occur: see Maximus Confessor, ii. p. 103 
Ὁ, TO μὲν φυσικὸν ὥρισεν ἐπ᾽ αὐτοῦ, τὸ 
δὲγνωμικὸν ἀποδιώρισε, translated “ natu- 


rali in eo (Christo) constituta voluntate, 
arbitrariam dispunxit,”’ ἐδ. p. 131 ο, ὡς 6 
λόγος ἦν αὐτοῦ, μόνον τὸ ἐμπαθές, ἀλλ᾽ οὐ 
τὸ φυσικὸν ἀποδιορίσασθαι θέλημα, 
‘quod dixerat hoc solum spectare ut 
libidinosam, non ut naturalem voluntatem 
a Salvatore eliminaret,’ Severus de 
Clyst. xxxii., xxv., ὅταν ταῦτα τὰ συμ- 
πτώματα ὄψῃ παρόντα, ἀποδιόριζε τὴν 
ὀργανικὴν νόσον ἐκ τῆς ὁμοιομεροῦς. The 
simple διορίζω is found in Lev. xx. 
διώρισα ὑμᾶς ἀπὸ τῶν ἐθνῶν ““1 separated 
you from the nations,” Job xxxv. 11; so 
ἀφορίζω Matt. xxv. 32, ἀφορίζει τὰ 
πρόβατα ἀπὸ τῶν ἐρίφων, Acts xix. 9 
(Paul left the synagogue) καὶ ἀφώρισεν 
τοὺς μαθητάς, 2 Cor. vi. 17, ἐξέλθατε 
ἐκ μέσου αὐτῶν καὶ ἀφορίσθητε, Luke vi. 
22 (ofexcommunication) ὅταν ἀφορίσωσιν 
ὑμᾶς, Gal. ii. 12 (οἵ Peter’s withdrawal 
from the Gentiles) ὑπέστελλεν καὶ ἀφώ- 
ριζεν ἑαυτόν. 

ψυχικοί., Used of worldly wisdom in 
James iii. 15, where see note, distinguished 
from πνευματικός in 1 Cor. ii. 13-15, xv. 
44, cf. the teaching of the Naassenes (af. 
Hippol. p. 164) εἰς τὸν οἶκον θεοῦ οὐκ 
εἰσελεύσεται ἀκάθαρτος οὐδείς, οὐ ψυχι- 
κός, οὗ σαρκικός, ἀλλὰ τηρεῖται πνευμα- 
τικοῖς. 

πνεῦμα μὴ ἔχοντες. The subjective 
negative may be explained as describing 
a class (such as have not) rather than as 
stating a fact in regard to particular per- 
sons; but the use of μή is much more 
widely extended in late than in classica! 
Greek, cf. such phrases as ἐπεὶ μή, ὅτ' 
μή. It is simplest to understand πνεῦμα 
here of the Holy Spirit, cf. Rom. viii. 9, 
ὑμεῖς οὐκ ἐστὲ ἐν σαρκὶ GAN’ ἐν πνεύματι, 
εἴπερ πνεῦμα Θεοῦ οἰκεῖ ἐν ὑμῖν, τ Cor. 
ii. 153, vii. 40, I John iii. 24, iv. 13, and 
the contrast in ver. 20, ἐν πνεύματι ἁγίῳ 
προσευχόμενοι. Others, e.g. Plumptre, 
prefer the explanation that ‘the false 
teachers were so absorbed in their lower 
sensuous nature that they no longer pos- 
sessed, in any real sense of the word, 


24, 


0 
~I 
- 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ETIZTOAH 


20— 


« a OES , > ~ ε 4 a e€ , 
20. Υμεις δέ, ἄγαπητοι, ἐποικοδοβοῦντες EQUTOUS TH ἀγιωτατῃ 
a , 
ὑμῶν πίστει, ἐν πνεύματι ἁγίῳ προσευχόμενοι, 21. ἑαυτοὺς ἐν 
a , A ~ 
ἀγάπῃ Θεοῦ τηρήσατε προσδεχόμενοι τὸ ἔλεος Tod κυρίου ἡμῶν 


1a ηρησατε] τηρησωμεν BC, 


that element in man’s compound being, 
which is itself spiritual, and capable there- 


fore of communion with the Divine 
Spirit”. 
Vv. 20-23. The Final Charge to the 


Faithful.—Use all diligence to escape 
this danger. Make the most of the 
privileges vouchsafed to you. Build 
yourselves up on the foundation of your 
most holy faith by prayer in the Spirit. 
Do not rest satisfied with the belief that 
God loves you, but keep yourselves in 
His love, waiting for the mercy of our 
Lord Jesus Christ which leads us to 
eternal life. And do your best to help 
those who are in danger of falling away 
by pointing out their errors and giving 
the reasons of your own belief; and by 
snatching from the fire of temptation 
those who are in imminent jeopardy. 
Even where there is most to fear, let 
your compassion and your prayers go 
forth toward the sinner, while you shrink 
from the pollution of his sin. 

Ver. 20. ὑμεῖς δὲ, ἀγαπητοί. Con- 
trasted with the libertines, as in ver. 17. 

ἐποικοδομοῦντες ἑαυτοὺς τῇ ἁγιωτάτῃ 
ὑμῶν πίστει. For the spiritual temple, 
cf. © Pet. 11. 9:8: Col. i. 23; Eph. ii. 20- 
22, ἐποικοδομηθέντες ἐπὶ TO θεμελίῳ τῶν 
“ἀποστόλων καὶ προφητῶν, ὄντος ἀκρογω- 
νιαίου αὐτοῦ Χριστοῦ ᾿Ιησοῦ x.T.A., I 
Cor. iii. 9-17, a passage which the writer 
may have had in his mind here and in 
ver. 23. Dr. Bigg compares Polyc. Phil. 
iii. “ΤΙ ye study the epistles of the blessed 
apostle Paul, δυνηθήσεσθε οἰκοδομεῖσθαι 
els τὴν δοθεῖσαν ὑμῖν πίστιν. Add Clem. 
Strom. v. p. 644, ἣ κοινὴ πίστις καθάπερ 
θεμέλιον ὑπόκειται. Usually Christ is 
spoken as the foundation or corner-stone 
of the Church, and we should probably 
assign an objective sense to τῇ πίστει 
here, as in ver. 3 above (ἐπαγωνίζεσθαι 
τῇ πίστει). Otherwise it might be ex- 
plained of that faculty by which we are 
brought into relation with the spiritual 
realities (Heb, xi. 1, πίστις ἐλπιζομένων 
ὑπόστασις, πραγμάτων ἔλεγχος οὐ 
βλεπομένων), that which is the introduc- 
tion to all the other Christian graces, see 
note on 2 Pet. i. 5, and which leads to 
eternal life (x Pet. i. 5,andg, κομιζόμενοι 
τὸ τέλος τῆς πίστεως ὑμῶν, σωτηρίαν 
ψυχῶν). The faith is here called “ most 


holy,” because it comes to us from God, 
and reveals God to us, and because it is 
by its means that man is made righteous, 
and enabled to overcome the world (1 
John v. 4,5). Cf. 1 Pet.v. 9, ᾧ ἀντίστητε 
στερεοὶ τῇ πίστει. 

ἐν πνεύματι ἁγίῳ προσευχόμενοι. 
These words, contrasted with πνεῦμα 
μὴ ἔχοντες in ver. 19, show how they are 
to build themselves up upon their faith. 
I understand them as equivalent to James 
v. 16, δέησις δικαίου ἐνεργουμένη, where 
see note. Compare also Eph. vi. 18, διὰ 
πάσης προσευχῆς προσευχόμενοι ἐν 
παντὶ καιρῷ ἐν πνεύματι, Rom. viii. 26, 
27. 

Ver. 21. ἑαυτοὺς ἐν ἀγάπῃ Θεοῦ 
τηρήσατε. In ver. 1 the passive is used: 
those who are addressed are described as 
kept and beloved (cf. ver. 24, τῷ δυναμένῳ 
φυλάξαι): here the active is used and 
emphasised by the unusual order of 
words ; each is to keep himself in the 
love of God, cf. James, i. 27, ἄσπιλον 
ἑαυτὸν τηρεῖν, Phil. ii. 12, τὴν ἑαυτῶν 
σωτηρίαν κατεργάζεσθαι: Θεὸς γάρ 
ἐστιν 6 ἐνεργῶν ἐν ὑμῖν. Again in ver. 
2 the writer invokes the divine love and 
mercy on those to whom he writes : here 
they are bidden to take steps to secure 
these. Compare Rom. v. 5, ἣ ἀγάπη 
τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐκκέχυται ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις 
ἡμῶν διὰ πνεύματος ἁγίου τοῦ δοθέντος 
ἡμῖν, ib. viii. 39, πέπεισμαι ὄτι οὔτε 
θάνατος οὔτε ζωὴ . .. οὔτε τις κτίσις 
ἑτέρα δυνήσεται ἡμᾶς χωρίσαι ἀπὸ τῆς 
ἀγάπης τοῦ Θεοῦ, John xv. 9. καθὼς 


«ἢγάπησέν pe ὁ πατὴρ κἀγὼ ὑμᾶς 


ἠγάπησα, μείνατε ἐν τῇ ἀγάπῃ τῆ ἐμῇ. 
ἐὰν τὰς ἐντολάς μου τηρήσητε, μενεῖτε 
ἐν τῇ ἀγάπῃ pov. The aor. imper. is 
expressive of urgency, see note on ἡγήσ- 
ασθε, in James i. 2. 

προσδεχόμενοι TO ἔλεος. Cf. Tit. ii. 
13, προσδεχόμενοι THY μακαρίαν ἐλπίδα 
καὶ ἐπιφάνειαν τῆς δόξης τοῦ μεγάλον 
Θεοῦ καὶ σωτῆρος ἡμῶν ᾿]. X., and 2 
Pet. iii. 12, 13, 14. The same word is 
used of the Jews who were looking for 
the promised Messiah at the time of 
His first coming, Mark xv. 43, Luke il. 
25, 38. 

els ζωὴν αἰώνιον. Some connect this 
closely with the imperative τηρήσατε, 
but it seems to me to follow more natu- 


55: 


3 - 
Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ εἰς ζωὴν αἰώνιον. 


διακρινομένους,2 23. ols δὲ ὃ σώζετε * 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


22. Kat οὗς μὲν ἐλέγχετε 


275 


1 


ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες, ots δὲ 


leNeyyere AC vulg. boh. arm. + ; ἐλεατε δῷ ΒΟΞ; eXeerte KLP +. 
2 Staxpivopevous MABC; διακρινομενοι KLP. 


3 ous Se (1) NACKLP; om. B. 


rally on the nearer phrase, mp. τὸ ἔλεος : 
cf. I Pet. i. 37, εὐλογητὸς ὁ Θεὸς .. . 6 
κατὰ τὸ πολὺ αὐτοῦ ἔλεος ἀναγεννήσας 
ἡμᾶς εἰς κληρονομίαν ἄφθαρτον. . . 
τετηρημένην ἐν οὐρανοῖς εἰς ὑμᾶς τοὺς 
- + » φΦρουρουμένους ... εἰς σωτηρίαν 
ἑτοίμην ἀποκαλυφθῆναι ἐν καιρῷ ἐσχάτῳ. 

Ver. 22. οὖὗς μὲν ἐλέγχετε διακριν- 
ομένους. On the reading see the Intro- 
duction. For the form ὃς μέν instead of 
6 μέν, cf. Matt. xiii. 8, xxii. 5, Luke xxiii. 
33, Acts xxvii. 44, Rom. xiv. 5, 1 Cor. 
vil. 7, xi. 21, 2 Cor. ii. 16, 2 Tim. ii. 20, 
not used in Heb., 1 and 2 Pet., James or 
John. The doubled és δέ is found in 
Matt. xxi. 35, ὃν μὲν ἔδειραν, ὃν δὲ 
ἀπέκτειναν, ὃν δὲ ἐλιθοβόλησαν, 7b. xxv. 
15, ᾧ μὲν ἔδωκεν πέντε τάλαντα, ᾧ δὲ 
δύο, ᾧ δὲ ἕν. The use is condemned as 
a solecism by Thomas Magister and by 
Lucian, Soloec. 1, but is common in late 
Greek from the time of Aristotle, cf. 
Sturz. Dial. Maced. pp. to5f. On the 
word ἐλέγχω (here wrongly translated 
‘« strafen,’’ in the sense of excommunica- 
tion, by Rampf), see Const. Apost. vii. 
5, 3, ἐλεγμῷ ἐλέγξεις τὸν ἀδελφόν σου, 
and Hare’s excellent note L in his 
Mission of the Comforter, where he 
argues that the conviction wrought by 
the Spirit is a conviction unto salvation, 
rather than unto condemnation; and 
quotes Luecke as saying that “ ἐλέγχειν 
always implies the refutation, the over- 
coming of an error, a wrong, by the 
truth and right. When this is brought be- 
fore our conscience through the ἔλεγχος, 
there arises a feeling of sin, which is 
always painful: thus every ἔλεγχος is a 
chastening, a punishment.” Compare 
Grote’s life-like account of the Socratic 
Elenchus in his Hist. of Greece. 

This verse seems to be referred to in 
Can. Apost. vi. 4, οὐ "μισήσεις πάντα 
ἄνθρωπον, ἀλλ᾽ ots μὲν ἐλέγξεις, ots δὲ 
ἐλεήσεις, περὶ ὧν δὲ προσεύξῃ, obs δὲ 
ἀγαπήσεις ὑπὲρ τὴν ψυχήν σου, which 
is also found in the Didache ii. 7, with 
the omission of ots δὲ ἐλεήσεις. Cf. 
John xvi. 8, ἐκεῖνος ἐλέγξει τὸν κόσμον 
περὶ ἁμαρτίας καὶ περὶ δικαιοσύνης καὶ 
περὶ κρίσεως, τ Cor. xiv. 24, ἐλέγχεται 
ὑπὸ πάντων (the effect of the prophets’ 
teaching on an unbeliever), Tit. i. 13, 
ἔλεγχε αὐτοὺς ἀποτόμως ἵνα ὑγιαίνωσιν 


4 σωΐετε ΨΚ ΑΒΟ; εν φοβῳ σωΐετε KLP. 


ἐν τῇ πίστει, ib. i. 9, τοὺς ἀντιλέγοντας 
ἐλέγχειν, 2 Tim. iv. 2 (the charge to 
Timothy) ἔλεγξον, παρακάλεσον ἐν 
πάσῃ μακροθυμίᾳ, Apoc. ui. 19, ὅσους 
ἐὰν φιλῶ ἐλέγχω καὶ παιδεύω, Eph. v 
13, τὰ δὲ πάντα ἐλεγχόμενα ὑπὸ τοῦ 
φωτὸς φανεροῦται. There is a tone of 
greater severity in the ποιῆσαι κρίσιν 
καὶ ἐλέγξαι of the 15th verse, but even 
there we need not suppose that the 
preacher is hopeless of good being ef- 
fected. The point is of importance in 
deciding the mutual relations of the 
three cases here considered. 

διακρινομένους. We should have ex- 
pected a nominative here to correspond 
with ἁρπάζοντες and μισοῦντες in the 
following clauses, and so the text. rec. 
has διακρινόμενοι; wrongly translated in 
A.V., as ifit were the active διακρίνοντες, 
“ἐ making a difference”. This gives such 
a good sense that some commentators 
(e.g. Stier) have been willing to condone 
the bad Greek. It would have been 
better to alter the reading at once. Keep- 
ing the reading of the best MSS. we may 
either take the accusative as comple- 
mentary to ἐλέγχετε (as we find in Plato, 
Theaet. 171 D, ἐμὲ ἐλέγξας ληροῦντα, 
Xen. Mem. 1, 7, 2, ἐκεγχθήσεται γελοῖος 
ὦν, Jelf, § 681), or simply as descriptive 
of the condition of the persons referred 
to. There is also a question as to the 
meaning we should assign to διακρ. Is 
it to be understood in the same sense as 
in James i. 6, ii. 4? In that case we 
might translate ‘‘ convict them of their 
want of faith,’’ taking the participle as 
complementary to the verb ; or ‘‘ reprove 
them because of their doubts”’. It seems 
more probable, however, that the mean- 
ing here is ‘‘ convince them when they 
dispute with you,” which we may com- 
pare with 1 Pet. iii. 15, ἕτοιμοι ἀεὶ πρὸς 
ἀπολογίαν παντὶ τῷ αἰτοῦντι ὑμᾶς 
λόγον. . . ἀλλὰ μετὰ πραὔτητος καὶ 
φόβου (cf. ἐν φόβῳ below). So taken, 
this first clause would refer to intellectual 
difficulties to be met by quiet reasoning; 
the force of διακρινόμενος being the 
sameas that in ver. 9, τῷ διαβόλῳ διακρ., 
and in Socr. E.H. v. 5, ὃ λαὸς εἶχεν 
ὁμόνοιαν Kal οὐκέτι πρὸς ἀλλήλους 
διεκρίνοντο. 


Ver. 23. σώζετε. Here again a word 


276 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ΕΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 38: τ 


ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ, μισοῦντες καὶ τὸν ἀπὸ τῆς σαρκὸς ἐσπιλωμένον 


χιτῶνα. 


24. Τῷ δὲ δυναμένῳ φυλάξαι ὑμᾶς 2 ἀπταίστους ὃ καὶ στῆσαι 


lous δε (2) ἐελεατε ev φοβῳ ΑΒ; om. KLP; εν φοβῳ Ο. 
2 ypas NQBCL vulg. syrr. boh.; npas A; αὐτους ΚΡ, 
8 απταιστους] add. και ασπιλους C. 


which is strictly applicable to God is 
transferred to him whom God uses as 
His instrument, cf. 1 Pet. iv. 11 and 
notes on τηρήσατε, ἐλέγχετε above, 
especially James v. 20, ὁ ἐπιστρέψας 
ἁμαρτωλὸν ἐκ πλάνης ὁδοῦ αὐτοῦ σώσει 
ψυχὴν ἐκ θανάτου. 

ἐκ πυρὸς ἁρπάζοντες. The expres- 
sion is borrowed from Amos iv. If, 
κατέστρεψα ὑμᾶς καθὼς κατέστρεψεν ὁ 
Θεὸς Σόδομα καὶ Γόμορρα, καὶ ἐγένεσθε 
ὡς δαλὸς ἐξεσπασμένος ἐκ πυρός, καὶ 
οὐδ᾽ ὡς ἐπεστρέψατε πρός με, λέγει 
Κύριος, and Zech. iii. 3, οὐκ ἰδοὺ οὗτος 
δαλὸς ἐξεσπασμένος ἐκ πυρός; Both 
passages have further connexions with 
our epistle, the former from the reference 
to Sodom (see above ver. 7), the latter as 
following immediately on the words, 
ἔπιτιμήσαι σοι Κύριος quoted in ver. 9, 
and precéding a relerence to filthy gar- 
ments (see note below). In it the High 
Priest Joshua is a representative of 
Israel, saved like a brand from the 
captivity, which was the punishment 
of national sin. The image of fire is 
naturally suggested by the allusion to 
the punishment of Sodom in the passage 
of Amos, and of Korah (see above ver. 7) 
described in Num. xvi. 35, Ps. cvi. 18, 
ἐξεκαύθη πῦρ ἐν τῇ συναγωγῇ αὐτῶν καὶ 
φλὸξ κατέφλεξεν ἁμαρτωλούς. The 
writer may also have had in mind St. 
Paul’s description of the building erected 
on the One Foundation (see above ver. 
20), which, he says, will be tried by fire, 
1 Cor. iii. 13-15, ἑκάστου τὸ ἔργον, ὁποῖόν 
ἐστιν, TO πῦρ αὐτὸ δοκιμάσει . .. εἴ 
τινος τὸ ἔργον κατακαήσεται, ἕημιω- 
θήσεται, αὐτὸς δὲ σωθήσεται, οὕτως δὲ 
ὡς διὰ πυρός. Such an one may be 
spoken of as “ἃ brand snatched from 
the fire,’? not however as here, saved 
from the fire of temptation, but as saved 
through the agency of God’s purgatorial 
fire, whether in this or in a future life. 

ἐλεᾶτε ἐν φόβῳ. The faithful are 
urged to show all possible tenderness for 
the fallen, but at the same time to have 
a fear lest they themselves or others 
whom they influence should be led to 
think too lightly of the sin whose ravages 


they are endeavouring to repair. Cf. 
2 Cor. vii. 1, καθαρίσωμεν ἑαυτοὺς ἀπὸ 
παντὸς μολυσμοῦ σαρκὸς Kal πνεύματος 
ἐπιτελοῦντες ἁγιωσύνην ἐν φόβῳ Θεοῦ, 
Phil. ii. 12, .1.Pet. 1.:17, iit. 15." For the 
coniusion of the contracted verbs in -έω 
and -ἄω in late Greek see Jannaris, ὃ 850. 
§ 854 f., Winer p. 104. The best MSS. 
read ἐλεᾷ in Prov. xxi. 26, and ἐλεῶντος 
Rom. ix. 16, but ἐλεεῖ in Rom. ix. 18. 

μισοῦντες Kal τὸν ἀπὸ τῆς σαρκὸς 
ἐσπιλωμένον χιτῶνα. While it is the 
duty ot the Christian to pity and pray 
for the sinner, he must view with loath- 
ing all that bears traces of the sin. The 
form of expression seems borrowed from 
such passages as Isa. xxx. 22, Lev. xv. 
17, perhaps too from Zech. iii. 4, ᾿Ιησοῦς 
ἦν ἐνδεδυμένος ἱμάτια ῥυπαρά. ΟἿ. 
Apoc. iii. 4, οὐκ ἐμόλυναν τὰ ἱμάτια 
αὐτῶν, and Afocal. Pauli quoted by 
Spitta, ὁ χιτών pov οὐκ ἐρυπώθη. The 
derivatives of σπίλος are peculiar to late 
Greek: the only other examples of 
σπιλόω in Biblical Greek are James iii. 
6, ἣ γλῶσσα... ἣ σπιλοῦσα ὅλον TS 
σῶμα and Wisd. xv. 4, εἶδος σπιλωθὲν 
χρώμασι διηλλαγμένοις. Compare for 
the treatment of the erring 2 Tim. ii. 
25, 26, ἐν πραὕὔὕτητι παιδεύοντα τοὺς 
ἀντιδιατιθεμένους, μήποτε δῴη αὐτοῖς 
ὁ Θεὸς μετάνοιαν εἰς ἐπίγνωσιν ἀληθείας, 
καὶ ἀνανήψωσιν ἐκ τῆς τοῦ διαβόλον 
παγίδος. 

Vv. 24, 25. Final Benediction and 
Ascription. I have bidden you to keep 
yourselves in the love of God; I have 
warned you against all impiety and im- 
purity. But do not think that you can 
attain to the one, or guard yourselves 
from the other, in your own strength. 
You must receive power from above; 
and that it may be so, I offer up my 
prayer to Him, who alone is able to keep 
you from stumbling, and to present you 
before the throne of His glory, pure and 
spotless in exceeding joy. To Him, the 
only God and Saviour, belong glory, 
greatness, might, and authority through- 
out all ages. 

Ver. 24. τῷ δὲ δυναμένῳ φυλάξαι 
ὑμᾶς ἀπταίστους. Apparently ἃ reminis- 


24. 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ΒΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


277 


κατενώπιον τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ ἀμώμους 1 ἐν ἀγαλλιάσει, 25. μόνῳ 3 


lapwpous] αμεμπτους A. 


cence* of Rom. xvi. 25 f., τῷ δὲ Suva- 
μένῳ ὑμᾶς στηρίξαι. .. μόνῳ 
σοφῷ Θεῷ διὰ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, 
ᾧ ἡ δόξαεἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν 
αἰώ γεν. Similarly the noble doxo- 
logy in Eph, iii. 20, commences τῷ δὲ 
δυναμένῳ. The reading ὑμᾶς is con- 
firmed by the evidence of δ and B, which 
was unknown to Alford when he en- 
deavoured to defend the reading αὐτούς, 
found in KP and some inferior MSS. 

ἄπταιστος. Occurs in 3 Macc. vi. 39, 
μεγαλοδόξως ἐπιφάνας τὸ ἔλεος αὐτοῦ 
ὁ τῶν ὅλων δυνάστης ἀπταίστους αὐτοὺς 
ἐρρύσατο: used here only in the N.T. 
The verb wratw has the same figurative 
sense in James ii. 10, iii. 2, ef τις ἐν 
λόγῳ οὐ πταίει, οὗτος τέλειος ἀνήρ, 
2 Pet. i. 10, ταῦτα ποιοῦντες οὐ μὴ 
πταίσητέ ποτε. 

στῆσαι κατενώπιον τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ 
ἀμώμους ἐν ἀγαλλιάσει. Cf. Matt. xxv. 
31-33, ὅταν δὲ ἔλθῃ ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου 
ἐν τῇ δόξῃ αὐτοῦ. .. στήσει τὰ μὲν 
πρόβατα ἐκ δεξιῶν αὐτοῦ, Acts vi. 6, 
οὺς ἔστησαν ἐνώπιον τῶν ἀποστόλων, 
Col. i. 22, παραστῆσαι ὑμᾶς ἁγίους καὶ 
ἀμώμους καὶ ἀνεγκλήτους κατενώπιον 
αὐτοῦ (which Lightfoot refers to present 
approbation rather than to the future 
judgment of God, comparing Rom. xiv. 
geet) COLy 1.) 20,52, Cor: i1t7, iv. 2; Vils 
12, xii. 10). In the present passage the 
addition of the words τῆς δόξης shows 
that the final judgment, the goal of 
φυλάξαι, is spoken of. Hort, in his 
interesting note on 1 Pet. i. 19, τιμίῳ 
αἵματι ὡς ἀμνοῦ ἀμώμου Kal ἀσπίλου 
Χριστοῦ, traces the way in which the 
words μῶμος ‘‘blame,” and ἄμωμος 
‘blameless,’’ come to be used (in ‘‘ the 
Apocrypha, the N.T., and other books 
which presuppose the LXX”’) in the 
entirely unclassical sense of ‘‘ blemish ”’ 
and “ unblemished ” cf. Eph. i. 4, v. 27, 
Heb. ix. 14. In 2 Pet. iii. 14, ἀμώμητος 
seems to be used in the same sense. 
The word κατενώπιον is apparently con- 
fined to the Bible, where it occurs in 
Josh. i. 5, xxi. 42, Lev. iv. 17, Eph. i. 4, 
ἀμώμητος κατενώπιον αὐτοῦ ἐν ἀγάπῃ. 
κατένωπα is found in Hom. J]. xv. 320. 
For ἀγαλλίασις see Hort’s note on 1 Pet. 
i. 6, ἐν ᾧ ἀγαλλιᾶσθε, “in whom ye 
exult”’, The verb with its cognate sub- 
stantives ‘is unknown except in the 


2 μονῳ] add. σοφῳ KLP +. 


LXX and the N.T. and the literature 
derived from them, and in the N.T. it is 
confined to books much influenced by 
O.T. diction (Matt., Luke, Acts, 1 Pet., 
Jude, John, including Apoc.), being 
absent from the more Greek writers, St. 
Paul, and (except in quot.) Heb... . 
It apparently denotes a proud exulting 
joy, being probably connected closely 
with ἀγάλλομαι, properly ‘to be proud 
of,’ but often combined with ἥδομαι and 
such words.” 

Ver. 25. μόνῳ Θεῷ σωτῆρι ἡμῶν. See 
above on ver. 4, τὸν μόνον δεσπότην. 
God is called σωτήρ in Isa. xlv 15, σὺ 
yap εἶ Θεὸς... ὁ Θεὸς τοῦ ᾿Ισραῆλ 
σωτήρ, ib. ver. 21, Sir. li. 1, αἰνέσω σε 
Θεὸν τὸν σωτῆρά pov, Philo, Confis. 
Ling. §20,i. p. 418 jfin., τίς δ᾽ οὐκ ἂν 
+++ πρὸς τὸν μόνον σωτῆρα Θεὸν ἐκ- 
βοήσῃ (? -σαι); cf. Luke i. 47, ἠγαλλία- 
σεν τὸ πνεῦμά μου ἐπὶ τῷ Θεῷ τῷ σωτῆρί 
μουγ elsewhere in N.T. only in Tit. i. 3, 
li, IO, ili, 4, ὅτε ἣ χρηστότης. .- 
ἐπεφάνη τοῦ σωτῆρος ἡμῶν Θεοῦ. .. 
κατὰ τὸ αὐτοῦ ἔλεος ἔσωσεν ἡμᾶς διὰ 
πνεύματος ἁγίου οὗ ἐξέχεεν ἐφ᾽ 
ἡμᾶς πλουσίως διὰ ᾿]. X. τοῦ σωτῆρος 
ἡμῶν, τ Tim. i. τ, Παῦλος ἀπόστολος I. 
Χ. κατ᾽ ἐπιταγὴν Θεοῦ σωτῆρος ἡμῶνκαὶ 
X. Ἰ1. ἐδ. ii. 3, iv. 10. The later writers 
of the N.T. seem to have felt it needful 
to insist upon the unity of God, and the 
saving will of the Father, in opposition 
to antinomian attacks on the Law. 

διὰ ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ. It seems best to 
take διά with δόξα and the following 
words. The glory of God is manifested 
through the Word, cf. τ Pet. iv. 11, ἵνα 
ἐν πᾶσιν δοξάζηται ὁ Θεὸς διὰ “Il. X. ᾧ 
ἐστιν ἡ δόξα καὶ τὸ κράτος εἰς τοὺς αἰῶ- 
γας. 

δόξα. The verb is often omitted in 
these ascriptions, cf. 2 Pet. αὐτῷ ἢ δόξα, 
Rom. xi. 36, xvi. 27, Gal. i. 5, Luke ii. 16, 
δόξα ἐν ὑψίστοις Θεῷ. In τ Peter iv. 11 
it is inserted, ᾧ ἐστιν ἡ δόξα καὶ τὸ 
κράτος, and, as we find no case in which 
ἔστω is inserted, and the indicative is 
more subject to ellipse than the impera- 
tive, it might seem that we should supply 
“tis” here; but the R. V. gives ‘be,’ 
and there are similar phrases expressive 
of a wish or prayer, as the very common 
χάρις ὑμῖν καὶ εἰρήνη ἀπὸ Θεοῦ πατρός, 
where we must supply ἔστω or γένοιτο. 


*For the position and genuineness of this doxology see the Introduction and 
notes in Sanday and Headlam’s commentary, and the dissertations by Lightfoot 
and Hort in the former’s Biblical Essays, pp. 287-374. 


VOL. ν. 18 


ΙΟΥΔΑ ἘΠΙΣΤΟΛΗ 


28- 


Θεῷ σωτῆρι ἡμῶν διὰ; ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν δόξα μεγα- 


A lol “ εν > 
λωσύνη κράτος καὶ ἐξουσία πρὸ παντὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος καὶ νῦν καὶ εἰς 


πάντας 2 τοὺς αἰῶνας - ἀμήν. 


1 δια |. Χ. του κυριου μων] om. 


De Wette maintained that the following 
words πρὸ παντὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος, referring 
to already existing fact, were incompatible 
with a prayer; but it is sufficient that the 
prayer has regard mainly to the present 
and future; the past only comes in to 
give it a fuller, more joyful tone, remind- 
ing us of the eternity of God, as in the 
psalmist’s words, ‘‘I said it is my own 
infirmity, but I will remember the years 
of the right hand of the Most High,” 
and the close of our own doxology “as it 
was in the beginning, is now, and ever 
shall be”. I do not see, however, that 
we need exclude either interpretation. 
The writer may exult in that which he 
believes to be already fact in the eternal 
world, and yet pray for its more perfect 
realisation in time, as in the Lord’s 
Prayer, γενηθήτω τὸ θέλημά σου as ἐν 
οὐρανῷ καὶ ἐπὶ γῆς. The omission of 
the verb allows of either or both views in 
varying proportion. δόξα by itself is the 
commonest of allascriptions. Itis joined 
with τιμή in τ Tim. i. 17 and elsewhere, 
as here with μεγαλωσύνη. It is joined 
with κράτος in τ Pet. iv. 11, v. 11, Apoc. 
i. 6. Fuller ascriptions are found in 
Apoc. iv. 11, ἄξιος εἶ, ὁ κύριος . - - 
λαβεῖν τὴν δόξαν καὶ τὴν τιμὴν καὶ τὴν 
δύναμιν, v. 13, τῷ καθημένῳ ἐπὶ τῷ 
θρόνῳ... ἡ εὐλογία καὶ ἡ τιμὴ καὶ ἣ 
δόξα καὶ τὸ κράτος εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν 
αἰώνων, vii. 12, ἣ εὐλογία καὶ ἣ δόξα καὶ 
4 σοφία καὶ ἡ εὐχαριστία καὶ ἣ τιμὴ καὶ 
4 δύναμις καὶ ἣ ἰσχὺς τῷ Θεῷ ἡμῶν. 
Just before (ver. 10) we have the re- 
markable ascription 7 σωτηρία τῷ Θεῷ 
ἡμῶν. Compare with this the ascription 
of David (x Chron. xxix. 12), σοὶ Κύριε ἣ 
μεγαλωσύνη kal ἡ δύναμις καὶ τὸ καύχημα 
καὶ ἡ νίκη καὶ ἡ ἰσχύς, ὅτι σὺ παντων 
τῶν ἐν οὐρανῷ καὶ ἐπὶ γῆς δεσπόζεις. 
For a similar expression in regard to the 
future blessedness of man, see Rom. ii. 10, 
δόξα δὲ καὶ τιμὴ Kal εἰρήνη παντὶ τῷ 
ἐργαζομένῳ τὸ ἀγαθόν." An unusual form 
of ascription occurs in Clem. Rom. 59. 2, ἣ 
χάρις τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ 
μεθ᾽ ὑμῶν καὶ μετὰ πάντων πανταχῆ τῶν 
κεκλημένων ὑπό τοῦ Θεοῦ καὶ δι᾽ αὐτοῦ" 


KP. 


δι’ οὗ αὐτῷ δόξα, τιμή, κράτος καὶ 
μεγαλωσύνη, θρόνος αἰώνιος ἀπὸ τῶν 
αἰώνων εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων. 

μεγαλωσύνη. Only found elsewhere 
in N.T. in Heb, i. 3, ἐκάθισεν ἐν δεξιᾷ 
τῆς μεγαλωσύνης ἐν ὑψηλοῖς, repeated in 
viii. 1. Dr. Chase notes that it occurs in 
Enoch v. 4, κατελαλήσατε μεγάλους καὶ 
σκληροὺς λόγους ἐν στόματι ἀκαθαρσίας 
ὑμῶν κατὰ τῆς μεγαλοσύνης αὐτοῦ, xii. 
3, τῷ κυρίῳ τῆς μεγαλοσύνης, xiv. 16 (a 
house excelling) ἐν δόξῃ καὶ ἐν τιμῇ καὶ 
ἐν μεγαλοσύνῃ. It is coupled with δόξα, 
of which it may be regarded as an exten- 
sion, in the doxology used by Clem. Rom. 
20, 61. I am not aware of any other 
example of ἐξουσία in a doxology: com- 
pare, however, Matt. xxviii. 18, ἐδόθη 
po. πᾶσα ἐξουσία ἐν οὐρανῷ καὶ ἐπὶ γῆς. 

πρὸ παντὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος. Cf. τ Cor. ii. 
7 (τὴν σοφίαν) ἣν προώρισεν ὃ OcdsT po 
τῶν αἰώνων εἰς δόξαν ἡμῶν, Prov. viii. 23, 
πρὸ τοῦ αἰῶνος ἐθεμελίωσέμε (ἰ.6. σοφίαν), 
ἐν ἀρχῇ πρὸ τοῦ τὴν γῆν ποιῆσαι. An 
equivalent expression is πρὸ καταβολῆς 
κόσμου found in John xvii. 24, ἠγάπησάς 
pe π- κι. κι᾿ also Eph. i. 4, ἐξελέξατο ἡμᾶς 
ἐν αὐτῷ π. k. κι and I Pet. i. 20 (Χριστοῦ) 
προεγνωσμένου μὲν T. κικινρφανερωθέντος 
δὲ ἐπ᾿ ἐσχάτου τῶν χρόνων. St. Jude 
speaks of one past age and of several 
ages to come. On the other hand St. 
Paul speaks of many ages in the past (1 
Cor. 11. 7), and St. John of only one age 
in the future. 

εἰς πάντας τοὺς αἰῶνας. This precise 
phrase is unique in the Bible, but εἰς 
τοὺς αἰῶνας is common enough, as in 
Luke i. 33, Rom. i. 25, v. 5, xi. 36, xvi. 
27, 2 Cor. xi. 31, etc., so in LXX, Dan. ii. 
4, 44, vi. 6, 26. The stronger phrase eis 
τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων occurs in Gal.i. 5, 
Phil. iv. 20, τ Tim. i. 17, 2 Tim. iv. 18, 
Heb. xiii. 21, 1 Pet. iv. 11, v. 11, Apoc. i. 
6, etc. John uses only eis τὸν αἰῶνα 
apparently with the same meaning. Other 
variations are found in Eph. iii. 21, αὐτῷ 
ἡ δόξα ἐν τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ καὶ ἐν X. ἸἸ. εἰς 
πάσας τὰς γενεὰς τοῦ αἰῶνος τῶν αἰώνων, 
2 Pet. iii. 18, αὐτῷ ἡ δόξα καὶ νῦν καὶ εἰς 
ἡμέραν αἰῶνος. 


2 εις παντας] εἰς δῇ. 


* For a full account of the early doxologies, see Chase on the Lord’s Prayer (Texts 
and Studies, i. 3, p. 68 foll.). He states that the common doxology at the end of 
the Lord’s Prayer (σοῦ ἐστιν ἡ βασιλεία καὶ ἣ δύναμις Kal ἡ δόξα εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας 


‘appears to be a conflation of two distinct forms,” 


and ‘twas added to the Prayer 


in the ‘Syrian’ text of St. Matthew’s Gospel ”. 





i i ly, ᾿ i ‘ . Η ' zi | rer ᾿ ὃ i 
: wir ᾽ i | cab ϊ ‘ 
ἠδ ae 4 ᾿ Aa ᾿ ; : ᾿ ua ; j 


THE REVELATION | 
OF ᾿ | 
ST. JOHN THE DIVINE. | | 





James Morratt, D.D. 


Longsuffering toward us here is the Most High: 

He hath shown us that which is to be, 

And hath not hidden from us what befalleth at the end. 
For the youth of the world is over, 

Long since hath the strength of creation tatlied, 

And the advent of the times is at hand. 
The pitcher is nigh to the cistern, 

The ship to the haven, 
The caravan to the city, 

And life to its consummation. 

—The Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch (\xxxv. 8, 10), A.D. 70-10@, 


= 


INTRODUCTION. 


§ 1. The Text.—The exceptionally corrupt state of the Textus 
Receptus in the Apocalypse is due to the fact that for this book 
Erasmus (to whose text it goes back) had access to only a single 
cursive! (numbered 1) of the twelfth or thirteenth century. Even 
that was inferior and incomplete. The MSS. which have become 
available since his day are neither ample nor faultless. Throughout 
the five uncials (two of which, ἐ.6., C and P, are defective palimp- 
sests), over 1600 variants have been counted—excluding merely 
orthographical differences—in the 400 verses of the book; this 
proportion is considerably higher than in the Catholic epistles, for 
example, where 432 verses only yield about 1100 variants, The earliest 
uncial goes back to the fourth century (δ); A and C, the most 
weighty, to the fifth; Ὁ 3 to the eighth; and P to the ninth. Of 
these, SAQ are complete, while the Apocalypse in Q is bound up 
with the writings of Basil the Great and Gregory of Nyssa—“ one of 
many instances in which the Apocalypse was bound up with ordinary 
theological treatises instead of with the other N.T. writings” 
(Gregory i. 121). C lacks i. 1, iii. 19-v. 14, vii. 14-17, viii. 5-ix. 16, 
x. 10-xi. 3, xiv. 13-xviii. 2, xix. 5-end. P is defective in xvi. 12-xvii. 1, 
xix. 21-xx. 9, xxii. 6-end. 

SAC reflect a fairly uniform text, which seems to have been 
influenced by an older uncorrected text allied to that underlying the 
vulgate. Hence, as δὲ in the Apocalypse, owing to its eccentric 
element, is not of exceptional value by itself (though supported by 
the cursives 95 and 36), AC vg. form an important group of witnesses, 
to which the minuscule 95 (like 68 and 38) and Syr. seem allied. The 
relation of P and Q is less obvious. Their differences (they agree 


1 Relatively high among the secondary documents, but woefully inferior to the 
uncials. On the performance of Erasmus, see Delitzsch’s Handschrifte Funde, i. 
(1861), pp. 17 f., with A. Bludau’s essay on the Erasmus editions of the N.T. in 
Bardenhewer’s Biblische Studien, vii. 5. 

2To avoid confusion with the B of Codex Vaticanus, it is better to cite this 
codex Vaticanus as Q (so, after Tregelles, Weiss, Haussleiter, Bousset, Swetc) than 
as B (Tisch.) or B4 (WH, Simcox). 


282 INTRODUCTION 


only in about fifty cases against NAC) point either to two recensions 
of some older original (Bousset) or to a text based again upon some 
older revised text (Weiss). Q approximates rather to the cursives 
in text. But its archetype usually tallies with NAC, and is allied 
somehow to the text behind the so-called “Coptic”! version (cf. 
Goussen’s ‘“Theolog. Studia, fasciculus I.”: Apoc, S. Fohannis 
apostoli versio sahidica, 1895, pp. iv.-vii.), like a small group of 
cursives (Bousset’s Q rel.). In no one MS. or group of MSS. is a 
neutral or fairly accurate text preserved. This is mainly due to the 
interval which elapsed before the Apocalypse became generally 
canonical, particularly in the East; its text was less carefully 
guarded during this period than any other portion of the N.T., and 
even by the time that the NAC text (or texts) came into being, the 
book had not secured its canonisation throughout the Eastern 
churches. In addition to this, the grammatical irregularities and 
anomalies? which studded its pages tempted many a scribe to 
correct and to conform the text. Systematic emendation of this kind 
must have begun very early (Weiss, pp. 144 f.). 

This paucity and conflict of uncial evidence lends additional 
weight to the versions and patristic citations, especially as they 
reflect a text or texts which cannot be taken to be identical with, 
and yet must be older than, those underlying the MSS. Often, 
indeed, the versions themselves reproduce some of the most patent 
errors in the MSS., while the patristic texts are sometimes too 


1In the textual notes = Sah. (i.e., Sahidic): a further fragment is edited by J. 
Clédat in Revue de l’Orient Chrétien (1899), pp. 263-279. Gregory (pp. 546-547) 
throws both this and the later Bohairic or Memphitic version (= me.) back into the 
second century, but this is probably too early a date. All the extant fragments of 
the former are printed in Delaporte’s Fragments Sahidiques du'N.T. (Paris, 1906). 
For the latter, cf. Leipoldt in Church Quart. Rev., 1906, pp. 292 f. 

2These are not invariably Hebraisms, as Viteau and the older grammarians 
argue, but it is almost uncritical at the opposite extreme to rule out Hebraisms 
entirely. The Apocalypse is so saturated with the original text and the Greek version 
of the O.T., that there is more likelihood here than elsewhere in the N.T. of a 
grammatical solecism being due, directly or indirectly, to the influence of Semitic 
idiom. Even though a parallel instance can be adduced in some cases from the 
papyri or the κοινή elsewhere (cf. Helbing, p. iv.), this merely suggests a possible 
origin for the phrase in question. Besides, the Apocalypse is a piece of literary 
art. Where its eccentricities are not due to ignorance of Greek or to reminiscences 
of Hebrew idiom, they are deliberate violations of grammar and syntax in the 
interests of rhetoric or faith. That Greek was spoken in these Asiatic townships 
although native dialects lingered in the country, is shown by L. Mitteis in his 
Reichsrecht und Volksrecht in den dstlichen Provinzen d. rim. Kaiserreiches (1891), 


pp- 23 ἢ 


INTRODUCTION 283 


insecure to admit of reliable inferences being drawn from their 
contents (cf. Bebb in Studia Biblica, ii. 195-240). Yet, even with 
these drawbacks, one need not despair of utilising either. Thus 
the Latin versions! and patristic citations—which are of special 
moment, since the Apocalypse was never absent from the Latin 
N.T., and since the fourth century version did not affect it seriously— 
reveal a fairly distinctive Greek text behind the type of African text 
preserved by Cyprian (third century, citations in his Testimonia), 
Primasius, the sixth century African commentator, and the frag- 
mentary Fleury palimpsest (sixth or seventh century).* Critical 
opinion is still unse:tled upon the precise connexion of this text with 
the uncials, or even with the citations of Latin fathers like Tertullian, 
Jerome and Augustine, to say nothing of Ticonius, Beatus (eighth 
century), Haymo (ninth century) and Cassiodorus (sixth century). 
Thus it is quite uncertain whether the idiosyncrasies of Tertullian’s 
quotations reflect a private recension (so Haussleiter) or some eccles- 
iastical version, if they are not made directly from the Greek (cf. 
Nestle’s Einfiihrung, 94, 227 f., E. Tr. 119-20). Nevertheless, it is 
in this direction that the most promising outlook of textual criticism 
upon the Apocalypse lies. It has unique aid in the Latin versions. 
The greater respect shown by the ecclesiastical West to the Apo- 
calypse must have conspired upon the whole to give its text 
a better chance of preservation than in the East. Certainly, 
the fragments of the so-called African text carry us back to a 
Greek text of the Apocalypse which was current in the middle of 
the third century, prior to the origin of any extant uncial, while 
the evidence of Dr. Gwynn’s Syriac text comes only second in 
importance. The Greek citations of Clem. Alex. and Origen 
also echo a text which hardly corresponds to that of any of 
the uncials ; but, where the latter writer agrees with N, some early 
Alexandrian text may probably be discerned, which might be termed 
Western. His citations have also affinities with the text of S (cf. 
Gwynn, pp. lv. f.). As for the more important of the cursives, so far 
as they have been collated (cf. Gregory, i. 316-326, Scrivener’s 
Introd., 1894, i. 321-326), they seem mainly to corroborate other lines 


1Dr. Armitage Robinson (Cambridge Texts and Studies, i. 2, pp. 73, 97 f), 
followed by Dr. Salmon (Introd. to N.T., pp. 567 f.), even argues from the Ep. Lugd., 
(Eus., H. E., v. 1) that the Gallican churches must have had a Latin version of the 
N.T. (including the Apocalypse) by the middle of the second century, akin to the 
_ African old Latin. 

2Cf. Gregory, 609, and Mr. E. S. Buchanan’s collation in F¥ourn. Theol. Studies 
Viii., pp. 96 ἢ 


284 INTRODUCTION 


of evidence. Inthe dearth of better witnesses, their place is occa- 
sionally more serious than some editors would allow ; but no attempt 
at grouping them can be pronounced successful (about sixty contain 
the commentary of Andreas), and it is merely in the wake of earlier 
and heavier authorities that most of the minuscules can, asa rule, be 
employed with any safety. 

In the main, however, there is a fair consensus of editors (cf. 
W.H ., ii., 260 f.) for the bulk of the text as printed in the following 
pages. Exigencies of space have obliged the present editor to omit 
nearly all the textual material which he had amassed, and the only 
variants noted, as a rule, are those of direct significance for the 
expositor. Once or twice a variant has some intrinsic interest of a 
special kind, or the reading has had to be justified, but the textual 
notes do not profess to provide anything like a complete textual 
conspectus. Thus there is no discussion upon the gloss of S on ἀνὰ 
in iv. 8, upon the curious Syriac rendering of viii. 13 (as if peo. = 
μέσος οὐρὰ αἷμα), or upon the interpolation at xi. 1. All that one 
has been able to do is to furnish the reader with as accurate a text 
as possible for that elucidation of the religious ideas of the book 
which it is the primary object of the Expositor’s Greek Testament 
to facilitate. 


SpeciAL ABBREVIATIONS (cf. others in vol. ii. 754-756, 
iii. 33-36, 413). 


And.=comm.! of Andreas, bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia (fifth 
or sixth century), author of first Greek edit. (ἑρμηνεία εἰς τὴν 
᾿Αποκάλυψιν). Cf. von Soden’s die Schriften des N.T,, i. 1, 
472-475, 702 f., and Delitzsch’s Hands. Funde, ii. (1862), 
pp. 29 f. 

Areth.=comm. of Arethas, his successor (in 10th cent. ?), allied to 
Q (Delitzsch) as And. to A upon the whole. 

Arm.= Armenian version. Cf. Conybeare’s Armenian Version of Rev. 
(London, 1907), from codex 4 (12th cent.). 

Bs. = Bousset’s “ Textkritische Studien zum N.T.” (Texte u. Unter- 
suchungen, xi. 4, 1-44), 1894. 

edd. consensus or large majority of editors: so min. (minuscules), 
MSS. (manuscripts), and vss. (versions). 


1 Extant in these forms; Anda=codex August., 12th cent. (14th, Gregory), Andc 
=codex Coisl. (roth cent.), Andbav=codex Bavaricus (16th cent.), Andpal=codex 
Palatinus (15th cent.). The newly discovered commentary of Oecumenius (6th cent., 
cf. Diekamp in Sitzungsberichte der konigl. preuss. Akad., 1907, 1046 f.), as yet un- 
edited, may take the primacy from Andreas. 


INTRODUCTION 285 


gig. = codex gigas Holmiensis (13th cent.), witness either to old Latin 
text or to “late European” type (Hort). 

Pr.=Primasius, ed. Haussleiter in Zahn’s Forschungen zur Gesch. 
des NTlichen Kanons, iv., pp. 1-224 (1891), a very import- 
ant study. Cf. the same critic’s essay on Vict., Tic., and 
Jerome in Zeits. fiir Kirchl. Wiss. u. Leben (1886), 237-257. 

‘S.=Syriac Philoxenian recension (6th cent.), ed. Gwynn (1897) ; 
reflects a Greek text, which is mixed, but is in the main 
(Ixi. f.) allied to the normal uncial text, and is especially 
close to C and Origen (lv. f.). Cf. Gregory, ii. 507, 509. 

Spec. =pseudo-August. Speculum (8th or 9th cent.). 

Syr.=Harkleian recension (represented by about eight considerable 
MSS.): posterior and inferior to S. 

Tic.=“comm. in Apoc. homiliis octodecim comprehensus” of 
Tyconius the Donatist (end of 4th cent.). 

vg.=vulgate (Jerome’s version, 4th cent.), best preserved in codices 
Am. (=Amiatinus, 8th cent.), and Puld. (= Fuldensis, 6th 
cent.), Harl. (=Harleianus, 9th cent.), and Tol. (=Tole- 
tanus, 8th cent.). 

Vict.=comm. of Victorinus, bishop of Pettau in Pannonia (end of 3rd 
cent.). 

Ws. =B. Weiss: ‘die Joh. Apk., textkritische Unters. u. Textherstel- 
lung” (Texte u, Unters. vii. 1), 1891. 


§ 2. Analysis—The Apocalypse of John, which is thrown into 
epistolary form, is a slender book with a large design. After the title 
(i. 1-3) and prologue (i. 4-8) in which the prophet puts himself into 
relation with seven churches of Western Asia Minor, he proceeds to 
describe the vision of Jesus Christ (i. 9 f.) which furnished him with 
his commission to write! The immediate outcome of the vision is a 
series of charges addressed to these churches (ii.-iii.).2_ Like the 


1 The phrase ἐν κυριακῇ (=imperial, cf. Deissmann’s Licht vom Osten, 258 f.) 
ἡμέρᾳ (i. 10) denotes the Christian Sunday, not the day of judgment to which he 
‘was transported (so Wetstein, Weyland, Selwyn, Hort, Russell’s Pavousia, 371, 372, 
and Deissmann in E. Bz., 2815). The day of the Lord is only twice used in the Apoc. 
(vi. 14, xvi. 14), and there in a special eschatological connexion and in its normal 
grammatical form. In the Apocalypse it means the day of judgment, whereas in 
i. Io the words imply revelation, and the Apocalypse is not a mere revelation of the 
judgment-day. Besides, ἐν mv. must go here with éyev. as in iv. 2, otherwise it 
would have a verb of transport (so xvii. 3, xxi. 10). 

2 These are addressed to tiny communities in the cities, not to the churches as 
‘being in any sense the cities. The character and history of the Christian community 
care by no means to be identified with those of the city ; we have no reason to assume 
that the local Christians, who were ardently awaiting a citizenship from heaven, 


286 INTRODUCTION 


author of the 50th Psalm, he tries to rouse God’s people to the 
seriousness of their own position, before he enters into any predic- 
tions regarding the course of the outside world. The scene then 
changes to the celestial court (iv.-v.), where God appears enthroned 
in his presence-chamber over the universe, with Jesus installed as 
the divine revealer of providence in the immediate future. The 
description of the heavenly penetralia forms a series of weird Oriental 
arabesques, but the nucleus is drawn from the tradition of the later 
post-exilic prophets (especially Ezekiel). According to one phase of 
this tradition, the climax of things was to be heralded by physical 
and political disturbances; a regular crescendo of disasters was im- 
minent on the edge and eve of the world’s annihilation. Hence the 
next series of visions is full of material and military troubles, delineated 
partly in supernatural colours which are borrowed from the fanciful 
astro-theology of eschatological tradition. From this point onwards. 
the sword of the Lord is either an inch or two out of its scabbard, 
or showering blows upon his adversaries. In the prophet’s own 
metaphor, before the contents of the Book of Doom (in the hands. 
of Jesus Christ) can be read, its seven seals must be broken, and at 
the opening of each (vi.-vii.) some fresh woe is chronicled.1 The 
woe heralded by the seventh seal drifts over, however, into another 
series of fearful catastrophes which are introduced by seven trumpet 
blasts (viii.-ix.), and it is only on their completion that the way is 
now clear for the introduction of the protagonists in the last conflict 
upon earth. These protagonists are the messiah of God, 7.e., Jesus. 


had any vivid civic consciousness, or were keenly sensitive to the historical and. 
geographical features of their cities. The analogies sometimes drawn from the latter 
are interesting but for the most part specious and irrelevant coincidences. It is 
modern fancy which discovers in such directions any vital elements present to the 
mind of the prophet or his readers. Why these particular churches were selected, 
remains amystery. The cities in question were not all conspicuous for a special 
enforcement of the imperial cultus, and the churches themselves can hardly be sup- 
posed to be in every case representative or particularly important. Even the plaus- 
ible theory that they were the most convenient centres for district-groups of churches. 
(Ramsay, Seven Letters, pp. 180 f.) does not work out well in detail. 

1 The longing of the martyred souls in vi. 9-11 (‘‘lignes toutes divines, qui suf- 
front éternellement ἃ la consolation de l’4me qui souffre pour sa foi ou sa vertu,’’ 
Renan, 463), recalls the function of the Erinnys in Greek religion, the Erinnys 
being primarily “ the outraged soul of the dead man crying for vengeance” (cf. J. E. 
Harrison, Prolegomena to Study of Greek Religion, p. 214). Only, the souls in the 
Apocalypse are passive ; they do not actively pursue their revenge upon the living. 
The point of the vision is in part to reiterate the deterministic conviction that God 
has his own way and time; he is neither to be hurried by the importunity of his 
own people nor thwarted by the apparent triumph of his enemies. 


INTRODUCTION 287 


Christ, and the messiah of Satan, i.¢., the Roman empire in the 
person of its emperor with his blasphemous claim to divine honours 
upon earth. The series of tableaux which depict their entrance on 
the scene indicates that the prophet has now reached the heart and 
centre of his subject. But at this point his method alters, and the 
thread of purpose is less patent. Hitherto the Book of Doom, with 
its seven seals, has sufficed for the artistic and rather artificial pre- 
sentation of his oracles. Now that the seventh seal is broken, the 
Book, ex hypothesi, is opened; we expect the secrets of divine 
judgment to be unbared. Instead of describing what follows as the 
contents of this book, however, the prophet relates how he absorbed 
another and a smaller volume (x.), containing the sum and substance 
of the final oracles which bear on the world’s fate.1_ He then pro- 
ceeds, in terms of current and consecrated mythological traditions, 
to portray the two witnesses (xi.) who herald the advent of the 
divine messiah (xii.) himself, in the latter days. Messiah’s rival, the 
dragon or Satan, is next introduced, together with the dragon's 
commission of the Roman empire and emperor (xiii.) as the 
supreme foe of God’s people. Here is the crisis of the world! And 
surely it is a nodus dignus vindice ; God must shortly and sternly 
interfere. The imperial power, with its demand for worship, is con- 
fronted by a sturdy nucleus of Christians who will neither palter 
nor falter in their refusal to give divine honours to the emperor. 
Characteristically, the prophet breaks off to paint, in proleptic and 
realistic fashion, the final bliss of these loyal saints (xiv.), and the 
corresponding tortures reserved by God for the enemy and his 
deluded adherents. But at this point, just as the closing doom 
might be expected to crash down upon the world, the kaleidoscope 
of the visions again alters rather abruptly. The element of fantasy 


1The distinctive and Jewish characteristics of the following oracles (xi.-xiv., 
xvii. f.) suggest, as Sabatier was almost the first to see, that the contents of this 
βιβλαρίδιον are to be found here; so Weyland (a Jewish Neronic source in x.-xi. 13, 
xii,-xiii., xiv. 6-11, xv. 2-4, xvi. 13, 14, 16, xix. 11-21, xx.-xxi. 8), Spitta (a Jewish 
source, c. 63 B.C., in most of x.-xi. xiv. 14 f., xv. 1-8, xvi. I-12, 17, 21, xvii. 1-6, xviii., 
xix. 1-8, xxi. 9-27, xxii. I-3, 15), Pfleiderer (Jewish source, Neronic and Vespasianic, 
in most of xi.-xiv., xvii.-xix.), and J. Weiss (Jewish source, Neronic, in xi, I-13, xii. 
1-6, 14-17, xiii. I-7, xv.-xix., xxi. 4-27). But the first editor has worked over the 
contents of the βιβλαρίδιον so thoroughly that it is impossible to be sure that it ever 
was a literary unity. The probability is that xi.-xiii. at least reproduce fragments 
from it; the evidence hardly warrants us in postulating the incorporation of any 
coherent source. After chap. x. the symmetry of the Apocalypse is impaired by rapid 


and bewildering alterations of standpoint to which no satisfactory clue can be 
found, 


288 INTRODUCTION 


becomes still more lurid and ornate. The world of men and nature 
is drenched by a fresh series of chastisements (xv.-xvi.), which prove 
unavailing ; no repentance follows (xvi. 11, 21), and the climax of 
history is eventually reached through a succession of mortal penalties 
inflicted upon the city and empire of Rome (the vices of the empire 
being ascribed to the city, on the O.T. view which identified capital 
and kingdom, cf. Nah. iii. 1 f.), the votaries of the imperial cultus, 
and the devil himself (xvii.-xx). To the mind of an early Christian 
(cf. Tert., Scap., 2)! it was inconceivable that the world could long 
survive the downfall of the Roman empire. ‘And when Rome falls, 
the world.” All that the prophet sees beyond that ruin is the 
destruction of the rebels employed by God to crush the capital ; 
then—thanks to the survival of an O.T. idea, quickened by later 
tradition—a desperate recrudescence (xx. 7 f.) of the devil. His 
defeat ushers in the general resurrection and the judgment. Earth 
and sky flee from the face of God, but men cannot fly. They must 
stand their trial. Then follows the advent of a new heaven and 
earth (xxi.-xxii.) for the acquitted and innocent, with the descent of 
the new Jerusalem and the final bliss of God and of his loyal people. 
formed the nucleus of the book, as the author conceived it, the seals 
representing the certainty, the trumpets the promulgation, and the 
bowls the actual execution of the doom. They may have been com- 
posed at different times and re-arranged in their present order, like 
the books of the Aeneid, but, as they stand, they are closely welded 
together. The introductory Christophany leads up to ii,-iii., while 
these chapters again anticipate the visions of iv.-v., which are inde- 
pendently linked to i, (cf. i. 4=iv. 5, v.6; i. 5, 6=v. 9). Chapters vi.- 
ix, are interwoven, and, although the last cycle of seven (xv.-xvi.) 
seems abruptly introduced, it is really prepared for by x. (see notes), 
Like the Fourth Gospel, the Apocalypse has been edited, possibly 
after the author’s death, by the local Johannine circle in Asia 
Minor (e.g., i. 1-3, xxii, 18 f.); one or two cases of transposition 
by copyists also occur (cf. notes on xvi, 15, xviii. 14, xix. 9, xx. 14- 
xxii, 6 f,), and glosses may be suspected occasionally (¢.g., i. 18, iii, 8, 
ix. 9, xvii. 5; see ὃ 8). But substantially it bears the marks of com- 
position by a single pen; the blend of original writing and editorial 
re-setting does not impair the impression of a literary unity. This 
may be seen from the following analysis or outline :— 


1 The author of the Daniel-Apocalypse similarly believed that the resurrection of 
loyal Jews would follow the downfall of Antiochus Epiphanes (xii. 2, 13). 


INTRODUCTION 289 


i, 1-8, Prologue. 
i, 9-20, A vision of Jesus the messiah, introducing 
ii.-iii. Seven letters to Asiatic churches :— 


(x Ephesus. 

(2) Smyrna. 

(3) Pergamos. 

4 Thyatira. 

Sardis. 
(6) Philadelphia. 
(7) Laodicea. 
iV.-V. A vision of heaven: the throne of God, 

the Lamb, the book of Doom or Des- 
tiny, introducing the plagues of the 


Vi. Seven seals :— 
(1) The white horse. 
(2) ,, red ” 
(3) », black ,, 
(4) , pale ,, ' 
(5) ., souls of the slain. 
(6) ,, earthquake and eclipse, etc. 
Intermezzo :— 


vii 1-8, the sealing of the re- 
deemed on earth. 
Vii. 9-17. the bliss of the redeemed 
in heaven. 
viii. I. (7) 4, silence or pause. 
Vili. 2-5. A vision of heaven: an episode of angels, 
introducing 
viii. 6-ix, 21. Seven trumpet blasts for 
(x) earth. 
(2) sea. 


(3) streams: the star Wormwood. 
(4) an eclipse. 
3 a woe of locusts. 


(6) a woe of Parthian cavalry. 
Intermezzo :— 
Xe episode of angels and a 
booklet. 
xi. I-13. the apocalypse of the two 
witnesses. 
xi. 14-19. (7) voices and visions in heaven, 
introducing 
xii. A vision of (a) the dragon or Satan as the 
anti-Christ ; a war in heaven. 
xiii, I-10. (5) the Beast or Imperial omer Aas cin 
xiii. 11-18, (c) the false prophet or Imperial J earth. 
priesthood. 
Intermezzo :— 
Xiv. I-5. the bliss of the redeemed 
in heaven. 
xiv. 6-20. episode of angels amd 
doom on earth. 
xv. A vision of heaven: the triumph of the 
redeemed, introducing 
Xvi. Seven bowls with plagues for 
(τ) earth. 
(2) sea. 


(3) waters. 
(4) the sun. 


£90 INTRODUCTION 


(5) the realm of the Beast. 
(6) the Euphrates : an Eastern inva- 
sion. 
(7) the air: a storm, introducing 
A vision of Doom upon 


xvii. (a) The realm of the Beast, or Rome, 
at the hands of the Beast and 
his allies. . 
xviii. a song of doom on earth: 
xix. I-10. 5» », triumph in heaven. 
xix, II-21. (b) The Beast and his allies, and the 
false prophet. 
xX. I-10. (c) The Dragon or Satan himself, 


with his adherents. 
A vision of the new heaven and earth: 


including 
XX. II-xxi. 8. The judgment of the dead. 
xxi. Q-XxXii. 5. The descent of the new Jerusalem. 


xxii. 6-21. Epilogue. 


§ 3. Literary Structure —This general unity of conception as well 
as of style is a unity of purpose, however, rather than of design.! 
Once we descend into details another series of features emerges into 
view. Even upon the hypothesis that it was written by one author, it 
cannot have been the product of a single vision, much less composed 
or dictated under one impulse. Furthermore, inconsequence of a 
certain kind is one of the psychological phenomena of visions; a 
change comes over the spirit even of religious dreams, as they drift 
through the mind of the seer. But more than this is required to 
account for incongruities and differences of climate, as e.g., in xi. 1, 2, 
19 and xxi. 22, xi. 8 and xviii. 24, the various descriptions of the second 
advent (i. 7, xiv. 14 f., xix. 11 f.), of the judgment (xx. 11 f., xxii. 12), 
or of heaven (vii. 11 f., xv. 2, xix. 7 f, xxi. 1 f., xxii. 1-5, etc.), the 
isolated allusions to Michael, Gog and Magog, the four angels of vii. 
1-4, the carnage of xiv. 20, etc., the unrelated predictions which are 
left side by side, the amount of repetition, the episodical and con- 
flicting passages of vii. 1-8, 9-17, x., xi. 1-13, xiv. 1-5, 6-13, 14-20, xix, 
11 f., etc. Such phenomena are too vital and numerous to be ex- 
plained upon the same principle as the contradictions and discre- 
pancies which are to be found in many great works of ancient 


1 «Tt is of the nature of an epic poem describing what a Christian Homer might 
describe as ‘the good news of the accomplishment of the righteousness and wrath 
of God’”’ (Abbott, p. 75). Cf. Rom. i. 16-18, Apoc. vi. 17, x. 7, xi. 17, 18. The 
dramatic hypothesis, favoured by a series of students from Milton to Archbishop 
Benson, is worked out elaborately by Palmer and Eichhorn. The latter, after the 
prelude (iv. 1.-viii. 5), finds the first act in viii. 6-xii. 17 (overthrow of Jerusalem in 
three scenes), the second in xii. 18-xx. τὸ (downfall of paganism), and the third in 
xx, I1-xxii, 5 (the new Jerusalem). But all such schemes are artificial. 


INTRODUCTION 291 


literature, or even as the free play of a poetic mind; they denote 
in several cases planes of religious feeling and atmospheres of histori- 
cal outlook which differ not simply from their context but from one 
another. This feature of the book’s structure, together with the 
absence or comparative absence of distinctively Christian traits 
from certain sections, the iteration of ideas, the differences of 
Christological climate, the repetitions and interruptions, and the 
awkward transitions at one point after another, has given rise to the 
whole analytic movement of literary criticism upon the Apocalypse. 
The earlier phases are surveyed by A. Hirscht (Die Apocalypse u. 
ihre neueste Kritik, 1895), Dr. Barton (Amer. Fourn, Theol., 1898, 
776-801), and the present writer (Hist. New Testament, 1901, 677- 
689); for the later literature, see Dr. A. Meyer’s articles in the 
Theologische Rundschau (1907, 126 f., 182 f.), and an article by the 
present writer in the Expositor for March, 1909. The legitimacy of 
this method is denied by Dr. William Milligan (Discussions on the A po- 
calypse, 1893, pp. 27-74), Zahn in his Einleitung in das N.T. (§§ 72-75), 
and Dr. M. Kohlhofer (Die Einheit der Apocalypse, 1902), amongst 
others, but, although both attack and defence have too often proceeded 
upon the false assumption that the Apocalypse contains a balanced 
series of historical and theological propositions, or that it can be 
treated with the ingenuity of a Dante critic, the storm of hypotheses 
has at least succeeded in laying bare certain strata in the book, as 
well as a teleological arrangement of them in their present position. 
The Apocalypse is neither a literary conglomerate nor a mechanical 
compilation of earlier shreds and patches. There is sufficient evi- 
dence of homogeneity in style and uniformity in treatment to indicate 
that one mind has been at the shaping of its oracles in their extant 
guise (cf. G. H. Gilbert in Biblical World, 1895, 29-35, 114-123, and 
Gallois in Revue Biblique, 1894, 357-374). But the prophet has 
worked occasionally as an editor of earlier sources or traditions, as 
well as an original composer. These leaflets or traditions are stones 
quarried from foreign soils; it is no longer possible! to ascertain 
with any great certainty when or how or even why they were 
gathered. The main point is to determine approximately the object 
of the watch-tower which the apocalyptist built by means of them, 
and the direction of his outlook. In some cases it is probable that, 
alike as a poet and a practical religious seer, he was indifferent to 


1 The state of the extant literature leaves our knowledge of early eschatological 
tradition full of gaps. It is less exhilarating but more critical to mark the extent of 
the gaps than to attempt to fill them up or to bridge them with more or less airy 
guesswork, 


292 INTRODUCTION 


their origin, and in every case the important thing is to learn not 
the original date or shape of a source, or the particular mythological 
matrix of a tradition, but the new sense attached to it by the pro- 
phet himself and the precise object to which he adapted it. This 
consciousness of a purpose is the least obscure and the most Chris- 
tian feature of the Apocalypse. Strictly speaking, it is an apoca- 
lypse not of John but of Jesus as the Christ! (i. 1), and it is the 
triumphant adoration of Christ which gives an inner clue to the 
choice and treatment of the various messianic categories, Where 
the problems of structure arise, and where source-criticism of some 
kind? is necessary, in order to account satisfactorily for the literary 
and psychological data—is in the juxtaposition of disparate materials 
(cf. notes on vii., x., xi., xli., Xlii., Xiv., XVil., Xvili.). 

The results reached in the following commentary outline a theory 
of the Apocalypse, in its literary aspect, which falls under (a) the 
incorporation hypothesis. According to this view, the Apocalypse is 
substantially a unity, due to one hand, but incorporating several 
older fragments of Jewish or Jewish-Christian origin. So Weizsacker 
(ii. 173 f.), Sabatier (Les origines littéraires et la composition de 
l’Apocalypse, 1888: Jewish fragments in xi. 1-13, xii., xiil., xiv. 6-20, 
xvi. 18-14, 16, xvii. 1-xix. 2, xix. 11-xx. 10, xxi. 9-xxii. 5), Schon 
(L’origine de l’' Apocalypse, 1887: Jewish fragments in xi. 1-13, xii. 
1-9, 13-17, xviii. [except ver. 20]), Bousset, Jiilicher (Eznleitung in das 
N. T., § 22), C. A. Scott, Ε. C. Porter, A. Ὁ. M‘Giffert (History of 


1 The anti-Jewish note of the Apocalypse is as distinct as, though less loud than, 
the anti-Roman. Cf. notes, ¢g., on i. 6, 19 f., ii. g, iii. 7-10, ν. 9, 10, x. 7, Xi. 19, 
xxi. 22, xxii. 18. The Christian church was the new and true Israel, and thus. 
served herself heir to great traditions and to high destinies which were only inferior 
to her own in that they formed a lower slope on the same hill. One of the minor 
effects (which differentiates the Apocalypse from the Fourth Gospel) of this concep- 
tion is that Christians are not invited by John to love God or Christ; the temper of 
their vocation is defined in Jewish terms as a reverent fear of God (cf. xi. 18, xiv. 7, 
xv. 4, xix. 5). Another is the avoidance of ἐκκλησια as a collective term for the 
church and the ignoring of ἐπίσκοποι, διάκονοι, πρεσβύτεροι; etc.—for the twenty- 
four celestial πρεσβύτεροι, of course, have nothing whatever to do with the officials 
of the same name. 

2 English criticisms of Vélter’s first essays by Warfield (Presbyterian Review, 
1884, 228-265), and A. Robertson (Critical Review, Jan., 1895), of Vischer and 
Sabatier by Salmon (Introd. N.T., pp. 232 f.), of Vischer and of V6lter’s earlier 
theory by Simcox (pp. 215 f.), and of Vischer by Thomson (Books which influenced 
Our Lord, pp. 461 f.). Northcote once told Hazlitt that he believed the Waverley 
novels were written by several hands, on account of their inequalities. “ Some parts 
are careless, others straggling; it is only when there is an opening for effect that 
the master-hand comes in.” There are several criticisms of the Apocalypse which, 
with their quasi-reasons, recall this perverse and hapless verdict of a clever man. 


INTRODUCTION 293 


Apostolic Age, pp. 633 f.), A. Meyer (Theol, Rundschau, 1907, 
pp. 132 f.), Abbott, Baljon, Wrede (Entstehung der Schriften des N.T., 
103, 104), Schmiedel and Calmes. Pfleiderer’s two Jewish fragments 
ie in xi.-xiv., xvii.-xviii., and in xxi. 10-xxii.5. Those who are un- 
willing to admit the use of any Jewish sources fall back, as a rule, 
upon (b) the revision hypothesis of an Apocalypse which has been 
re-edited and brought up to date. This is represented best by Erbes 
(Die Offenbarung des Fohannes, 1891), who regards the original work 
as Johannine (before a.p. 70, incorporating one fragment of a 
Caligula apocalypse = xii.-xiii.), with editorial additions (Domitianic) 
in i. 1-3, 20, vii. 4-8, 13-17, ix. 12, xi. 14, xiii, 12, 14, xiv. 4, 8-92, xv. 
1, 5-xix. 4, xix. 9b-xx. 10, xxi. 5-xxii.2 (18-19?). Similarly, but very 
elaborately, Briggs (Messiah of Apostles, pp. 285 f.) discovers a four- 
fold process of editing, or rather of materials successively gathering 
round an original nucleus, while Dr. Barth, in his recent Eznleztung in 
d. N. T. (1908, pp. 250-276) goes to the opposite extreme of simplicity 
by conjecturing (partly along the lines followed by Grotius) that John 
simply revised, under Domitian, an earlier apocalypse of his own 
(written under Nero). Either (a) or (Ὁ) is preferable to the over- 
precision and disintegration of (c), the compilation hypothesis, 
according to which two or more large sources, fairly complete in 
themselves, have been pieced together by a redactor or redactors, 
So Weyland (Omwerkings-en compilatie-hypothesen, etc., 1888: two 
Jewish sources, with Christian editorial additions (c. a.p. 100) in 


xii. 11, 17c, xiv. 1-5, xv. 1, 6-8, xvi. 1-12, 15, 17a, 21, xvii. 14, xix. 7- 
10, 13d, xxii. 7a, 12, 13, 16-21), K. Kohler (Ε. ., x. 390-396: two 
Jewish sources, one from seventh decade, the other slightly later = 
x. 2-xi. 13, xii. 1-xiii. 10, xiv. 6 f.), Ménégoz (Annales de bibliog. 
Théol., 1888, 41-45; two Jewish sources), Bruston (Etudes sur 
Daniel et l Apocalypse, 1908, summarising his earlier studies: two 
Hebrew apocalypses, one Neronic=x. 1, 2, 8-11, xi. 1-13, 19a, xii,- 
xiv. 1, xiv. 4-end, xv. 2-4, xvi. 13-16, 19b, xvii.-xix. 3, xix. 11-xx.; the 


12, 13, xix. 4-10, xxi. 1-8, xxii. 6-13, 16, 17, 20, 21), Spitta (Ofenbarung 
des $ohannes, 1898: two Jewish sources, one B.c. 63 and one ec. 
A.D. 40, with a Christian apocalypse by John Mark c. a.p. 60), 
Schmidt (Anmerkungen, etc., 1891: three Jewish sources, iv. 1- 
vii. 8, viii. 2-xi. 15 [except x. 1-xi. 13], xii. 1-xxii. 5), Eugéne de 
Faye (Les Apocalypses Fuives, 1892, pp. 171 f.: two Jewish 
apocalypses, one from Caligula’s reign in vii. 1-8, viii. 2-ix. 21, 
x. la, 2b-7, xi. 14-15a, 19, xii.-xiv. 11, etc.; another=a.p. 69-70), 
VOL. ν΄ 19 


294 INTRODUCTION 


J. Weiss (die Offenbarung des $ohannes, 1904: two sources, one 
xiii, 11-18, xiv. 1-5, 14-20, xx. 1-15, xxi. 1-4, xxii. 3-5; one Jewish, 
c. A.D. 70), etc. Upon similar lines O. Holtzmann (in Stade’s Gesch. 
Israel, ii. 658 1.) detected two Jewish sources, one imbedded in the 
other, the earlier from Caligula’s period (xiii, xiv. 6 f.), the later 
irom Nero’s. The coast of reality almost disappears from view in 
Volter’s latest theory (die Offenbarung Fohannis, neu untersucht u. 
erklaért, 1904), which is a combination of (Ὁ) and (6) ; it postulates an 
apocalypse of John Mark (c. a.p. 65) and an apocalypse of Cerinthus 
(c. A.D. 7O0=x. 1-11, xvii. 1-18, xi. 1-13, xii. 1-16, xv. 5, 6, 8, xvi. 1-21, 
xix. 11—xxii. 6), both edited under Trajan and under Hadrian. Least 
successful of all, perhaps, in dealing with the complex literary and 
traditional data, is (d) the Jewish and Christian hypothesis, which is 
really a simplified variant of (Ὁ); e.g., Vischer (Texte u. Unter- 
suchungen, ii. 3, 1886, 2nd ed. 1895) finds the groundwork of the 
apocalypse to be an Aramaic Jewish writing (mainly) from a.p. 65- 
70, which was translated, re-set, and edited by a Christian (in the 
“Lamb ’”-passages, with i.-iii., v. 9-14, vii. 9-17, xii. 11, xiii. 9-10, 
xiv. 1-5, 12, 13, xvi. 15, xvii. 14, xix. 9, 10, 11, 13, xx. 4-6, xxi. 50-8, 
xxii. 6-21, etc.). Similarly Harnack (cbid.), Martineau (Seat of 
Authority, 217-227), and independently, an anonymous writer in the 
Zeitschrift fiir alt. Wiss. 1887, 167-171, as well as Dr. S. Davidson 
(Introd. to N. T., ii., pp. 126-233: the Apocalypse an Aramaic Jewish 
work translated, with additions and interpolations). Von Soden’s 
theory (Early Christian Literature, pp. 338 f.), which finds in viii. 1- 
xxii. 5 of the Johannine Apocalypse under Domitian, a Jewish 
apocalypse written between May and August of a.p. 70, lies, like 
C. Rauch’s (Offenbarung des $ohannes, 1894: Jewish composite 
nucleus, worked up by Christian editor) between (4) and (0). 

The unsatisfactory result of many of these hypotheses is due to 
the use of inadequate criteria or to the inadequate use of right 
criteria. The distinction of Jewish and Christian elements is parti- 
cularly hazardous in a book which deais with eschatology, where no 
Christian could work without drawing upon Jewish traditions. And 
these were neither stereotyped nor homogeneous. A given passage in 
the Apocalypse may not be couched in Christian language, but this 
does not necessarily prove that it was not written by a Christian; 
we know far too little about Jewish Christianity in the first century 
to be sure, apart from certain fundamental beliefs about Jesus, 
how far it diverged from cognate Jewish conceptions. A failure to 
appreciate either the poetic freedom of the Apocalyptist or the 


INTRODUCTION 295 


characteristic phenomena of apocalyptic writing in general has also 
turned some literary analysts into theorists of the narrowest parti 
pris. But such extravagances do not invalidate the legitimacy of the 
method in question; without some application of it, the phenomena 
of the book present a hopeless literary and psychological enigma, 
and it may fairly be concluded as well as argued that this apocalypse, 
like most others of its class, is composite to some degree. 

§ 4, Characteristic Features,—In spirit as well as in form the 
Apocalypse of John has affinities to the apocalyptic literature of the 
later Judaism.! An apocalypse was the word for a crisis, and for 
a crisis which bordered on the end. Whenever such epochs of dire 
emergency recurred, the faith of Israel rose in poignant hope that 
by breasting this wave of suffering they would soon be past the 
worst, and lie safe out of the swing of the sea. Since the exile, 
Israel’s foe had been some foreign power, whose policy threatened 
the religious conscience and whose annihilation was eagerly awaited 
by the faithful. Apocalypses frankly doomed the State and the world 
alike; they maintained an irreconcilable and pessimistic attitude 
towards both. Hence their speculation upon empires and emperors. 
Hence their constant appeal for courage, based on a conviction that 
God would intervene ere long in the political sphere to inaugurate a 
reign of the saints on earth. For the apocalypse was a programme 
of the immediate future on earth, or of a new earth, as well asa 
brilliant panorama of celestial mysteries vouchsafed to men in dreams 
or visions. Its subject was invariably ἃ δεῖ γενέσθαι ἐν τάχει. Apo- 
calyptic always spread its gorgeous pinions in the dusk of the national 
fortunes, but it strained to the near dawn of relief. 

Our concern, however, is with the genius rather than with the 
genus of John’s Apocalypse. It rises above its class quantum lenta 
solent inter uiburna cupressi. The uiburna are not to be ignored, 
indeed. Their order is the general order of the Apocalypse, and when 
the latter is approached from the side of the early Christian literature, 
it seems often to include material of little or no specific Christian value. 
There is a certain foreign air and shape about its foliage. But when it 
is approached through the tangled underwoods of apocalyptic writings 
in general, with their frigid speculations upon cosmic details, their 

1 For the characteristics of apocalyptic literature, and for the relation of apoca- 
lypse to prophecy, cf. §§ 6-19 of Liicke’s epoch-making Versuch einer vollstdndigen 
Einleitung in die Offenbarung ον. und in die gesammte apok. Literatur (sec. ed- 
1822) ; English summaries and surveys by Dr. Torrey (E. F. i. 669-675); L. Hassé in 
Inaugural Lectures (Manchester, 1905, 126-159); Dr. Driver (‘‘ Daniel,” τθοο, pp. 


Ixxxvi. f.); Dr. A. C. Zenos in Dict. of Christ and Gospels, i. 79-94: and Dr, R. H. 
Charles (E. Bi. 213-250, also 1338-1392 on Eschatology). 


296 INTRODUCTION 


wearisome and fantastic calculations, their tasteless and repulsive 
elements, and the turgid rhetoric which frequently submerges their 
really fine conceptions, the Apocalypse of John reveals itself as a 
superior plant. Its very omissions are significant. There is no 
allusion, ¢.g., to the prevalent category of the two cons, or to the 
return of the ten tribes, or to the contemporary Jewish wail over the 
cessation of sacrifice after a.p. 70 (e.g. in Apoc. Bar. x. 10), or to the 
martyrs’ death as expiatory (cf. 2 Macc. vii. 37 f.,4 Macc. vi. 29, xvii. 
21, etc.), or to any intercession of the prophet on behalf of the church 
(cf. 4 Esdras viii.). There is no cosmogony, no self-satisfied comparison 
of God’s people with pagans, no reference to the law! (in contrast to: 
the contemporary glorification, ¢.g., in 4 Esdras iii.-ix., Apoc. Bar. 
xv.-Ixix. [cf. Charles’ note on xv. 5], where it rivals even the messiah 
as a medium of fellowship and a nucleus of future bliss). There are 
no parables (as in 4th Esdras) or allegories; above all, there are no 
querulous complaints from the living. Carlyle describes the Girondist 
pamphlets as far too full of long-drawn out ejaculations, ‘‘ Woe is. 
me, and cursed be ye!” Even 4 Esdras, for all its noble pathos, 
partakes of this self-pity and fury; it is half-anger and half-agony. 
But the Apocalypse of John usually breathes another air, mitigating 
upon the whole the brusque temper of its class. Though the oppres- 
sion which makes a wise man mad may also make a good man sad, 
for all the feelings of exasperation and indignation stirred by the 
empire, the prophet John has not yielded to any pessimism about the 
cause of God. He never attempts to justify the ways of God, like 
his Jewish contemporaries, or to explain how the devil gave his power 
to the beast. His faith in Jesus as the messiah inspires a simple 
hope which enables him to remain unintimidated by the last threats 
and terrors of a foe whose end is near. The quarrel with Rome, e.g., 
is God’s affair. His people have merely to stand still and witness 
their enemy’s rout. 

It is this faith, this Christian consciousness, with its moral steadi- 
ness, which differentiates John’s Apocalypse from the other members 
of its class. To write an apocalypse meant, like the composition of 
a drama or a sonnet, conformity to certain literary rules or standards 
as well as approximation toa certain spiritandtemper. It justified, 
if it did not necessitate, the use of earlier fragments, which were only 
partially intelligible, since the agony of their hour had long passed 
by. Apocalyptic modified and adapted suck sources to the needs 
of a later generation.. There was a sequacity about apocalyptic 


1 This is all the more remarkable as contemporary Christians were being led, for 
ethical reasons, to view their religion more and more from a nomistic standpoint. 


INTRODUCTION 297 


literature. An author in this province could not start de novo ; not 
merely had conventional designs or traditions to be followed, but 
earlier products were commonly treasured and reset. John followed 
this method, but his regulative principle was unique, and one fascina- 
tion of his Apocalypse lies in the fact that we have here a Christian 
prophet half-mastering and half-mastered by the literary exigencies? 
of apocalyptic, uttering his convictions in strange and hardly re- 
levant terms which had hitherto been appropriated to alien ends. 
His vision of Jesus came to him through an atmosphere of trucu- 
lent and fantastic messianism, which was scarcely lucid at all points 
and which tended to refract if not to blur the newer light; yet 
the Christian messianic belief generally managed to overpower the 
inadequate, archaic, and incongruous categories of tradition, through 
which it had often to pass. It is this juxtaposition which helps to 
explain the occasional awkwardness and artificiality in the symbolism | 
of the Apocalypse. No doubt the author himself, whether as editor 
or composer, is partly responsible for this. A certain stiffness of 
structure pervades the book. There is a lack of sustained interest, 
and at several points the dove-tailing is defective, while, by a favourite 
Semitic device, repetition (cf. Augustine, Civ. Dez, xx. 17) is made to 
serve the purpose of emphasis. But such inconsistencies and 
inequalities are mainly due to the fact that the writer’s Christian 
consciousness repeatedly tends to break through forms too narrow 
for its fulness. Probably the materials at the author’s disposal 
would have been better arranged, had this been anything less than the 
presentation of a living Redeemer in heaven as the messiah of God’s 
people upon earth. The mere fact that the messiah had lived, 
involved a readjustment of messianic categories; the further fact 
that he had suffered and risen meant that many had to be reshaped, 
There are things in the Apocalypse which show a careful study of 
earlier prophetic scriptures and rabbinic traditions; but there are 


1 This applies to traditions (5. C. 252 f.) as well as to literature (Selwyn, 59 f.). A 
political and religious crisis promoted the resetting of older eschatological traditions 
and the resumption of such elements from the common fund or circle of apocalyptic 
teaching as had acquired special impressiveness (S.C. 221 f.). The different interpre- 
tations of Jeremiah’s prediction about the 70 years by the authors of Daniel and En. 
Ixxxix. 59 f., are a casein point. 

2One of the clearest instances of this may be found in the angelus interpres 
(cf. note on i. 1), which also illustrates, by the way, the difference between the 
Fourth Gospel and the Apocalypse. The Fourth Gospel scrupulously avoids 
connecting angels with Jesus. The only allusion to them, during his life-time, is 
the popular mistake (xii. 29 f.) which misinterpreted God’s voice to him as if it had 
been an angel’s voice. The Apocalypse, on the other hand, swarms with angels. 


298 INTRODUCTION 


other things which could only have been taught and learned within 
the school of Jesus Christ, and these are really the telling sentences 
throughout the book. 

At the same time it must be remembered that some of the very 
features which have lost much if not all of their significance for 
later ages, ornate and cryptic expressions, allusions to coeval hopes 
and superstitions, grotesque fantasies and glowing creations of an 
oriental imagination, the employment of current ideas about anti- 
christ, calculations of the immediate future, and the use of a re- 
ligious or semi-mythical terminology which was evidently familiar 
to some Asiatic Christians in the first century—these more or less 
ephemeral elements combined to drive home the message of the 
book. They signify to us the toll which had to be paid to contem- 
porary exigencies; without them the book could not have made 
its way at all into the conscience and imagination of its audi- 
ence. The momentum of its message lay, however, in the deep 
sincerity and lofty outlook of the prophet himself, and this broke 
out occasionally in passages of unexampled splendour and dignity. 
Sublimity, as a contemporary critic of literary style observed 
(Pseudo-Longinus, περὶ ὕψους), has always a moral basis; it is, he 
declared, the echo of a great soul (μεγαλοφροσύνης ἀπήχημα)---οΓ, we 
might add, of a great soul exercised upon a great issue. The same 
critic makes another remark, which is apposite to a passage like 
ch. xviii. of the Apocalypse. One avenue to sublimity, he notes, lies 
through imitation of and devotion to great writers of an earlier age: 
Ἔστι δὲ οὐ κλοπὴ TO πρᾶγμα, ἀλλ᾽ ὡς ἀπὸ καλῶν εἰδῶν ἢ πλασμάτων ἢ 
δημιουργημάτων ἀποτύπωσις. This canon throws a ray of light upon 
the special psychological problem of the Apocalypse’s relation to 
its O.T. and extra-canonical models. Some great writers in every 
period of literature are only to be understood in the light of a 
long series of predecessors, and the prophet John is one ofthese. His 
apocalypse in one aspect is the final and brilliant flash of the red 
light which had gleamed from Amos down to the Maccabees. His 
affinities in point of form, treatment, and general aim are with the 
line of literary prophets who, from Ezekiel to the authors of Daniel, 
4th Esdras, and Baruch, applied themselves to the statement and 
restatement of apocalyptic eschatology. John’s Apocalypse is 
flecked with allusions to Ezekiel, Zechariah,! and above all Daniel. 


1 In two aspects John resembles his prototype Zechariah: (a) in the employ- 
ment of an intricate symbolism, which makes it difficult to be sure where intuition 
ends and literary decoration begins, (b) in the use of schematism to explain provi- 
dence. For the latter, cf. Giesebrecht’s Die Berufsgabung der alttest. Probheten 


INTRODUCTION 299 


But his use of Daniel especially is more than that of a littérateur 
seproducing impressive and poetic conceptions from the study of a 
classic. For all the artistic and even artificial literary shape of the 
book, we should weigh it in the wrong scales were we to esti- 
mate it as the work of an author who simply drew upon such earlier 
models for his own later purposes. As contemporary rabbis not only 
pondered over passages like the Egyptian plagues, the prophecy of 
Gog and Magog, and the opening vision of Ezekiel, but even had 
ecstatic visions of heaven granted them (cf. R. $., 350, 379), so the 
prophet John was not a mere literary artist or a student of prophecy 
or an editor of earlier fragments. He was that, but he was more. 
Two features of his book differentiate him from such a class of 
writers ; (a) he was a prophet in his own way, and (6) his conscious- 
ness had been so powerfully affected by the post-exilic Judaism, as 
well as by contemporary beliefs, that it is not possible to derive his 
conceptions exclusively from those of the canonical Old Testament.} 
These two features partially coalesce. As a prophet, no less than 
as a student of the prophetic and apocryphal scriptures, John be- 
lieved that the predictions of Daniel were at last on the point of being 
fulfilled. This was the assurance which dominated his whole treat- 
ment of the O.T. in general. It explains how he appropriated and 
applied time-honoured messianic predictions which he considered 
relevant to Jesus the true messiah, and it also serves to account 
psychologically for the form of several visions (¢.g., that of ch. i.), 
which imply a mind already brooding over some of these passages. 
A well-known instance of this suggestion of visions occurs in Ter- 
tullian’s De anima, ix.: ‘‘Est hodie soror apud nos reuelationum 
charismata sortita, quas in ecclesia inter dominica sollemnia per 


(1897), pp. 60 f. (p. 68: bei Amos drangt ein Lebendiges zum Lichte, bei Sacharja 
herrscht das Programm). On Ezekiel as a prophet who foretold the coming of 
Christ, cf. Clem. Rom., xvii. 1. The typical and eschatological significance of the 
Egyptian plagues especially seems, from Irenzus (iv. 27, 28), to have impressed the 
Asiatic πρεσβύτεροι. 

1 The author knows the Hebrew original as well as the LXX (or, at any rate, 
some of his sources do), but the LXX quotations, or rather references (Swete, pp. 
exxxv.-cxlviii.) and reminiscences—for no formula of citation occurs—occasionally 
(cf. i. 7, ix. 20, x. 6, xii. 7, xiii. 7, xix. 6, xx. 4, 11) mark a deliberate divergence, not 
unexampled in the N.T., towards what was apparently a pre-Christian Greek version 
of the Hebrew, approximating to the version of Theodotion (particularly in Daniel). 
They thus anticipate the later preference of writers like Origen for the Theodotionic 
Daniel (cf. Salmon’s Introd. to N.T., pp. 547 f., and Swete’s Introd. to the O.T. in 
Greek, pp. 46f.), or else they prove that he was translating directly from the Hebrew 
text (so e.g. ini. 6, xi. 4?, xiv. 8,18). For instances of composite O.T. reminiscences 
of. Selwyn, pp. 62-64. 


300 INTRODUCTION 


ecstasin in spiritu patitur ; conuersatur cum angelis, aliquando etiam 
cum Domino, et uidet et audit sacramenta, et quorundam corda 
dinoscit, et medicinas desiderantibus submittit. lam uero prout 
scripturae leguntur aut psalmi canuntur aut allocutiones pro- 
feruntur aut petitiones delegantur, ita inde materiae uisionibus sub- 
ministrantur’”’. When John’s soul is stirred to creative vision or 
prediction, it is usually something he has heard or read in Daniel or 
Ezekiel which is moving on the face of the waters. But the form 
taken by some of the oracles cannot be explained simply from 
the sacred scriptures, and it is therefore necessary to define sepa- 
rately and more precisely each of the features which have been 
just mentioned, even though the former necessarily involves the 
latter. 

(a) The mind of a prophet like John is, in Wordsworth’s phrase, 
“a feeling intellect,” which instinctively embodies ideas in symbols. 
Thought rises before it in pictorial shape. Symbols are idea and 
picture at once; they embody beliefs and are also realities of a 
kind. Conceptions clothe themselves in vivid representations which 
are effective either on account of their traditional associations or 
from the aptness of their contemporary allusions, though it is often 
difficult for a modern reader to fathom their origin in the writer’s 
mind or to estimate the precise relation between the figurative 
element and the definite idea which that element is intended to 
enshrine.t The difficulty is doubled when, as in the present case, we 
have occasionally to deal with an ecstatic experience. The material 
to be interpreted includes the reflective working of the prophet’s 
mind upon a previous mental condition, the literary presentment 
(with some expansions, rearrangement and embellishment) of what 
he remembers to have seen in the exalted moments of rapture, 
together with the impressions produced by these upon his later con- 
sciousness. The Apocalypse is not a continuous vision. In garts, it 
is not a vision at all. There are rhapsodies in it, but it is not a 
rhapsody. Occasionally the prophet speaks as a counsellor, or 
writes as an editor of earlier fragments, or calculates the future 
in terms of traditional eschatology. The very elaboration with 
which the details and design of the book are worked out precludes 
any idea of it as a mere transcript of visions written when the seer’s 
memory was fresh, even though some phrases were set down as re- 
flective or editorial glosses. At the same time, the nucleus and the 
origin of the book are inexplicable apart from the presupposition of 

10n this power of the poetic Eastern imagination, at certain stages of culture, 


to fill sensuous forms with a higher content, see some admirable remarks in Caird’s 
Evolution of Religion, i. 287 fi. 


INTRODUCTION 301 


a definite religious experience which assumed in part the form of a 
trance or rapture. Vision here, as elsewhere, in apocalyptic litera- 
ture is occasionally the literary form of allegory and tradition ; but 
not always. The psychological problem is to explain the relation 
between this inner consciousness of inspiration and the curious 
imaginative forms in which the prophet seemed to think it needful 
to embody his Christian conceptions. He employs a large number 
of suggestive figures and metaphors, drawn from the Old Testament 
and elsewhere, in spite of their literal inadequacy ; these phantas- 
magoria it is impossible to regard as mere symbols, but on the other 
hand they are hardly to be taken literally in the case of John any 
more than that of the later prophets of Judaism (cf. Riehm’s Mes- 
sianic Prophecy, pp. 228 f.) from whom he borrowed many of them. 
Often the best way to explain them is to let them appeal to the 
religious imagination, since it is in this way that they are likely to 
-disclose any permanent truth of which they may be at once the 
‘vesture and the vehicle. But whatever they are, they are suggestive: 
not dogmatic ; they are poetic coefficients rather than logical defini- 
tions of the author’s faith. 

The comparative independence with which, like the psalmists (cf: 
‘Cheyne’s Origin of the Psalter, pp. 285, 286), he occasionally em- 
ploys “anthropomorphic, or, let us say at once, mythic expressions, 
is a consequence of the sense of religious security which animates ”’ 
him. These expressions helped out his Christian consciousness by 
their vivid realism and their time-honoured associations in the circles 
for which he wrote. He could embody in them some deeper truths 
-of his own faith. In this weird world of fantasy, peopled by a rich 
Oriental imagination with spectral shapes and uncouth figures,} 
‘where angels flit, eagles and altars speak, and monsters rise from 
sea and land—in a world of this kind many Asiatic Christians of that 
-age evidently were at home, and there the prophet’s message had 
to find them. Often the point of an allusion lies in some half- 
forgotten contemporary belief; the terms of it may be superstitious 
enough, but the aim is predominantly spiritual. An apt illustration 
of this procedure in the sphere of popular religion is afforded by 
Luther’s well-known use of the superstition about the wood of the 
-cross. “The cross of Christ,” he writes in one of his letters, “is 
parted throughout all the world, and every one meets with his 
portion. Do not you therefore reject it, but rather accept it as the 


1Even grotesque symbols of an Oriental cast would appeal to Hellenic readers 
-who were familiar, ¢.g., with ἐπε Ἄρτεμις πολύμαστος of Ephesus, on whose statue 
“winged bulls and rams appear (cf. Apoc. iv. 5 f.). 


‘ 302 INTRODUCTION 


most holy relic, to be kept, not in a gold or silver chest, but in » 
golden heart, that is, a heart imbued with gentle charity.” Here we 
have a Christian message couched poetically and effectively in terms 
of a familiar superstition which neither Luther nor his readers any 
longer shared. A similar explanation may fairly be applied now and 
then to John’s poetic use of the superstitions about amulets, talis- 
mans, secret names,! and the like, although it is often a fair question. 
how far his language is faded metaphor, and whether he did not 
sincerely attach himself to some of the current beliefs which under- 
prop his imagery. Otherwise we must allow that details are often 
used for their poetical impressiveness, which depends on the power 
of starting old associations and of suggesting dim, mysterious beliefs- 

His relation to history is equally free. Nothing could well be 
more jejune than to suppose that he is covertly conveying political 
information to his readers, or laboriously spelling out the course of 
providence from the politics, warfare, and meteorology of his age. 
History does not move in neat systems of seven, and even apocalyptic 
prophecy—for all its artificial dogmas and tendency to produce an im- 
pression by means of prediction—forms no calendar of exact events 
to come, much less any chronicle of recent happenings. It is the 
dogmatic programme which is uppermost in apocalyptic. The seer, 
by virtue of his inherited ideas, knew how external events must 
move; his schematism was more to him than anything else, and 
this accounts for the large haggadic element in such writings (cf. 
Baldensperger, 100, 117 f.). But John’s prophetic impulse in the 
revelation of Jesus to his spirit overbore the tendency to rest the 
weight of his message on exact disclosures of the future. “For the 
mass of his audience,’’ George Eliot says of Savonarola (Romola, 
ch. xxv.), “all the pregnancy of his preaching lay in his strong. 
assertion of supernatural claims, in his denunciatory visions, in the 
false certitude which gave his sermons the interest of a political 
bulletin.” John’s forecasts, such as they were, did not aim, at any 
rate, at the gratification of curiosity, and even his dogmatic pro- 
gramme was little more than a traditional form of expressing his 
absolute certainty that the God of Jesus Christ would conquer evil. 

(Ὁ) As a product of Asiatic Christianity towards the close of the 
first century, no less than as a member of a literary class which was 
usually heterogeneous in eschatology, the Apocalypse further reflects. 
the religious syncretism which prevailed especially in Phrygia and 


privileges of the Divine cult after death, instead of the pagan cults which they- 
abjure. 


INTRODUCTION 303 


the surrounding districts. The visions of the book are frequently 
put in terms of local and contemporary religion. Even the contour 
of what are apparently Old Testament reminiscences is occasionally 
modified by the collateral foreign tendencies which permeated post- 
exilic Judaism, especially along apocalyptic lines (cf. Cheyne’s Bible 
Problems, 70 f.). Thus (a) the Babylonian background of several 
conceptions! is now recognised on all hands (see notes on i. 4, 20, iv. 
me, ¥. 6, vis) f., xiii. 11, xiv. 6,)xtx, 7) 16) xxi’ 1-2, 18, xxii. 1, 16). 
The gnosticism of Asia Minor during the second century reveals the 
survival and adaptation of more than one feature which was ultimately 
due to Babylonian mythology or astro-theology, and the previous 
developments of Judaism had already assimilated ideas from the 
older speculations of the Babylonians. (δ) Along with this, traits 
corresponding to analogous conceptions in Egyptian religion are 
fairly common (see notes on i. 8, ii. 7, 11, 17, 26 f., iv. 3, 9, v. 13, vii. 
16, xii., xiv. 5, xv. 6, xxii. 4, 16). This is hardly surprising, as Egyp 
tian prophecy probably affected Hebrew prophecy (cf. Wilcken it 
Hermes, 1905, 544 f.), as the relations between Asia Minor and Egypt 
were close, and as the latter country was the natural home of escha- 
tology.2 (ὁ) The Hellenic traits, though fewer and fainter, are not 
inconspicuous (cf. notes on ii. 17, iv. 11, vii. 9, 16, viii. 5, ix. 11, xii., 
xv. 6, xx. 8 f.), but specifically Orphic features (cf. Maas, Orpheus, 
1895, pp. 250-261) are scarcely recognisable. (d) The Zoroastrian ὃ 


1 Especially behind xii. (cf. Calmes, Rev. Biblique, 1903, 52-68, and Jeremias 
pp- 34f.). But cosmological traits or traditions from Babylonia will not explain the 
entire form of this oracle (cf. Cheyne’s Bible Problems, 195-207, and Kohlhofer, 
pp- 72 f.), and even elsewhere they break down. Thus it is extremely questionable 
if the Babylonians had any conception of the millennium or of the resurrection of the 
dead; the accusing function of the devil is absent from Babylonian theology, as are 
the features of xiii. 11-17; and the Babylonian origin of the heavenly temple seems 
to be highly doubtful (cf. Prof. G. B. Gray in Expos., 1908, May-June). 

2 Hermas, the next apocalypse of the early church, is tinged at one point by 
this influence (cf. Reitzenstein’s Potmandres, 12 f.). The occupation of the Cyclades 
led to the introduction of many Egyptian deities into the local cultus between 308 
and 146 B.c. (cf. F. Hiller von Gaertringen’s Beitrdge zur alten Gesch., i., 1902, pp. 
218 f.), including not only Isis but that worship of the Ptolemies which, e.g.in Thera 
(cf. the same writer’s Thera, i., pp. 237 f.) fostered the later Imperial cultus of Rome. 
Some further Egyptian parallels are collected by Miss A. Grenfell in The Monist 
(1906), 179-200. 

3 The English reader may consult Prof. Moulton’s article on ‘‘ Zoroastrianism” 
in Hastings’ Dict. B., vol. iv., E. Bi. iv. 5428-5442, Lightfoot’s Colossians, pp. 
385 f.), and Renan (pp. 470 f.). I have stated and discussed the general evidence in 
H. $., 1903-1904. The best investigations are in the ¥ahr. fir protest. Theologie, 
Hiibschmann (1879, pp. 203-245) and Brandt (1892, pp. 405 f., 575 f.) respectively., 
Cf. also Béklen and Stave (§ 10). 


304 INTRODUCTION 


influence is strongly marked, though not so strongly as Vélter, in 
his latest volume (pp. 29 f., 63 f., 86 f., 116 f.), would make out. 
This, like that of Babylonia, reaches back not simply to the indirect 
channel of the post-exilic Judaism, but apparently to an almost 
direct relationship. In Zoroastrian angelology and eschatology alone, 
for example, does anything adequate correspond to the sort of con- 
ceptions which in their present shape are peculiar, or almost peculiar, 
to the Apocalypse: viz. (i.) the binding or noosing of the fiend (xx. 
1 f.,cf. S. B. E., v. 19), (ii.) the blasting of the third part of the earth 
(viii. 7 £., cf. S. B. E., v. 164, where the climax of the evil spirit’s 
work is that “he took as much as one-third of the base of the sky in 
a downward direction, into a confined and captive state’), (iii.) the 
seven spirits of God (i. 4, cf. Encycl. Religion and Ethics, i. 384-385, 
and S. B. E., iv. pp. Ixxi. f.), (iv.) the guardian fravashis of the churches 
(see note on i. 20—quite an Avestan touch), (v.) the recrudescence 
of evil genii before the consummation (xx. 7 f., cf. Stave, pp. 227 f.), 
(vi.) the emphasis on the millennium-period,! and (vii.) the renewal of 
the universe. See, further, notes on i. 13, ii. 5, iv. 3, vii. 17, xi. 5 f., 
xiv. 17 f., xvi. 13, 20. Upon the other hand, no distinct references 
to Mithraism (as, ¢.g., against Barns in Expfos., iii. 220 f.; Titan, the 
number of the Beast = Mithra as sun-god) can be detected, while the 
Buddhistic or Indian parallels are scanty and as a rule remote. 
Nothing is more deceptive than such coincidences between primi- 
tive religions. Si duo faciunt idem, non est idem. They may simply 
be due in certain cases to analogous but independent movements of 
the religious feeling in different quarters. Here as elsewhere infer- 
ences have to be drawn with extreme caution, yet there is good 
reason to believe that a number of the special traditions and para- 
phernalia used in the Apocalypse owed part of their form, if not of 
their content, to ideas which were current in Jewish and pagan 
circles during the first century in Asia Minor. The coincidences 
with Oriental religious conceptions (cf, ¢.g., J. Brandis in Hermes, 
1867, pp. 259-284) are too numerous and too striking to be dismissed 
in every case as accidental. Even when the cord is Christian, it may 
be spun out of several variegated threads, though it is often diffi- 


1 Plutarch (De Iside, 46 f.), in describing the Zoroastrian doctrines of the Magi 
as these were known to Romans and Greeks of the first century 4.D., closes by 
sketching the final doom of Ahriman, when the earth lies smooth under a single 
ruler and a single language, and ‘at the end Hades shall fail and men be happy” 
(Apoc. xx. 6-14). Similarly, the fierce doom of Apoc. xix. 17-18, where birds are 
summoned to eat the flesh of messiah’s victims, is probably a reflex of the supreme 
penalty inflicted on the carcases of those who resist Mazdeism, v7z., that they be 
devoured by birds of prey (S. B. E., iv. 27, 131). 


INTRODUCTION 305 


cult and sometimes impossible to determine where the threads were 
drawn from. Clemen’s Religionsgeschichtliche Erklirung des Neuen 
Testaments (1909) is a convenient handbook to the whole subject of 
these highways and byways of the apocalyptic fairy-land. 

8 5. The Nero-redivivus Myth.—The most central of these co- 
efficients, drawn. from a mixture of supernatural and political legends, 
is the belief in the return of a Nero-antichrist from the underworld. 

The massacre of a.p. 64 had invested Nero with such peculiar 
infamy for the early Christians, that it is not surprising to find 
Satan’s chief agent in the final attack upon God’s kingdom depicted 
by the prophet John as an infernal Nero, issuing from the under- 
world to head a coalition of the East against Rome and then against 
the Christ. Both the Jewish and the Christian literature of this 
period show traces of the successive phases of the Nero-redivivus 
anticipation (Suet. Nevo, 47).1 The legend sprang up on Roman 
soil, People could hardly credit the tyrant’s death, so sudden and 
secret had been its circumstances. A curious mixture of relief and 
regret prevailed after the removal of the last member of the Julian 
dynasty at the age of thirty-two. For some time, indeed, a more or 
less sincere belief (Tacit., Hist. 11, 8,9) prevailed, that he could not 
have died, but must be lying hidden somewhere in the East. This 
idea was suggested by his friendly relations with Parthia, and per- 
haps corroborated by the wide-spread notion, which he had encour- 
aged in his own life-time, that he would reign over the East from 
Jerusalem, or that Rome was to be supplanted by an Eastern empire 
(Suet. Nevo, 40, Vesp. 4, Tacit. Ann, xv. 36, Hist. v. 13, 3: pluribus 
persuasio inerat antiquis sacerdotum litteris contineri eo ipso tem- 
pore fore ut ualesceret Oriens profectique Judaea rerum potirentur ; 
cf. Joseph. Bell. vi. 5, 4). On the strength of this superstition, 
edicts were actually issued in Nero’s name, ‘quasi uiuentis et breui 
magno inimicorum malo reuersuri’ (Suet. Nevo, 57). The East 
was disturbed by pretenders, who exploited this superstition. One 


1 In Sib. iv. 119 f. the great king (.e., Nero) flies away wounded across the 
Euphrates into Parthian territory, while in Sib. iv. 137-139 (after 80 a.D.) the erup- 
tion of Vesuvius is taken as a portent of Nero’s immediate return from the East 
with a huge retinue to wreak vengeance on Rome. In another of these Asiatic 
oracles (v. 143-147, dating 71-74 A.D.) the flight of the detested and unpopular 
Nero from Babylon (i.¢., Rome) to the Parthians is described. Hereaches the king- 
dom of the Medes and Persians, to return in the last days (361 f.) for a bloody con- 
quest of the earth (κοσμομανὴς πόλεμος). Cf. Geffcken’s studies ‘‘ Zur dlteren 
Nero-sage” in Nachrichten d. Gétting. Gesellschaft d. Wissensch. (1899), pp. 443 f. 
The presence of the Nero-myth in the Apocalypse seems to have been first re-dis- 
covered by a Spanish Jesuit, Juan Mariana, who commentéd on the book in 1619. 


306 INTRODUCTION 


appeared shortly (Tac. Hist. ii., 8-9) after Nero’s death; another 
(Terentius Maximus) came forward in 80 4.p., who bore a physical 
resemblance to the emperor, and was only surrendered by the 
Parthians to Domitian after some years of power; a third emerged 
in 88 a.v. (Suet. Nevo, 57). This created disaffection, especially in 
the Eastern provinces (Tacit. Hist. 1.2: “ mota prope etiam Partho- 
rium arma falsi Neronis ludibrio’’), where revolutionary hopes and 
dislike of the existing régime were only too easily excited. Even 
under Trajan, Nero was believed by some to be still alive somewhere 
(Dio Chrysost. Orvat., xxi.), but by that time the illusion had been 
broken for most people, or rather it had been transmuted into the 
shuddering belief that Nero would return from the under-world. The 
political expectation thus became semi-supernatural or transcend- 
ental.! In certain Jewish and early Christian circles towards the close 
of the first century, particularly throughout Asia Minor, Nero-redivi- 
vus became fused with the other weird figures of Beliar and the anti- 
christ. To some of the Romans Domitian was another Nero, To the 
Christians who shared John’s view, Nero was to come again in an- 
other form. The Apocalypse passes over the Beliar-myth of a Satanic 
accuser who thwarts and seduces God’s people (cf. Introd. to 
2 Thessalonians); incidentally, it assigns this function to the 
dragon, Satan (xii. 10). But it follows one cycle of Jewish tradition 
in associating antichrist with some political or foreign persecuting 
power (Antiochus Epiphanes, Daniel; Pompey=dragon, Ps. Sol. 
ii. 29; head of Roman Empire, Apoc. Bar., xxxix.-xl.). The dragon 
Satan delegates his authority on earth to the Roman empire and 
emperor. The supreme enemy on earth, however, is the weird, 
spectral figure of this revenant Nero, who reappears in history (A. C. 
pp. 184 f.; cf. for contemporary Jewish evidence, Dr. L. Ginzberg in 
E. F., 1. 625-627 on Nero as the devil-antichrist). Thus it is that 
the saga is doubled, not in xiii, 1-10, 11-18, so much as in xvii., and 
this doubling seems to be anticipated even in xi. 7 (compare xiii. 
1 f.). The seduction of the Jews by antichrist proper (xi. 7 ἢ.) is 
subordinated by the prophet John to the seduction of the pagan 
nations (xili.-xiv., xvi.-xvili.), the latter being regarded as a far more 
ominous sign of the end. On the other hand, Nero-redivivus is 
employed, quite in Old Testament fashion, as the unconscious in- 
strument of the divine vengeance upon Rome-Babylon ; then he falls 
as a just victim to God’s wrath. 


1 On the apocalypse as a means of transition from political to transcendental 
messianism, see Dr. Shailer Mathews’ scholarly pages (pp. 25 f.) in his Messiante 
Hope in the New Testament (1906). 


INTRODUCTION 307 


The eschatological portent of Nero-redivivus, however, was 
bound up with the pressing claim of the Roman emperors to be 
worshipped as divine, and it was the latter peril which formed at once 
the occasion and the theme of John’s Apocalypse. 

§ 6. The Imperial Cultus.—Over two centuries earlier the great 
exemplar of apocalyptic literature had been issued in order to nerve 
the faithful who were persecuted for refusing to admit the pre- 
sumptuous divine claims of Antiochus Epiphanes. The Apocalypse 
of John is a latter-day pamphlet thrown up by a similar crisis. The 
prophet believed that the old conflict had now revived in its final 
form; Daniel’s predictions were on the way to be fulfilled at last in 
an age when the Roman emperor insisted upon being worshipped 
as the august lord and god of men! 

Since the days of Augustus, the emperor had been viewed as the 
guardian and genius of the empire, responsible for its welfare and 
consequently worthy of its veneration. It was a convenient method 
of concentrating and expressing loyalty, to acknowledge him as 
entitled to the prestige of a certain sanctity, even during his life- 
time. There were no monarchical traditions available to strengthen 
the sense of imperial patriotism, and it was a politic step of the 
emperor to, permit a certain adoration to gather round his official 
figure, an adoration which was generally the outcome of gratitude 
to the dead and deference to the living ruler for his εὐεργεσίαι (cf. 
Rushforth’s Latin Historical Inscriptions, pp. 46 f., and A. J. H. 
Greenidge’s Roman Public Life, pp. 440, 444, with Gwatkin’s article 
in Hasting’s D.B., iv., pp. 293-295). The imperial cultus in this 
aspect was instinctive rather than deliberate, developing out of 
certain germs within the ancient mind, such as the blend of religion 
and patriotism among the Persians, the custom of hero-worship 1 
(ἀφηρωίΐξαι, especially prevalent in the Ionian islands, e.g., at Thera, 
cf. CIG, 2467—2473, Usener’s Gotternamen, 1896, pp. 249-250), and 
the worship of the Ptolemies which shocked the pious Plutarch. 
Its primary aim was to foster patriotism by presenting a symbol of 


1 For the Latin germs of Caesar-worship, prior to Augustus, see Mr. E, Fiddes in 
Historical Essays (Manchester), 1902, pp. 1-16. Many heroes were πάρεδροι θεοί, 
associated with specific gods in a cult as σύνναοι or σύνθρονοι of the gods (cf. E. 
Kornemann’s essay ‘‘ Zur Gesch. der antiken Herrscherkulte” in Beittrdge zur alten 
Gesch., i. 51 f.); ¢.g., the later Attalidae at Pergamum had statues in the temple 
dedicated to them as divine (pp. 85 f.). The shrinking of the Christian conscience 
from this deification or apotheosis reveals the significance of the divine honours 
-paid to Jesus in the Apocalypse. The position assigned him by Christian faith was 
no result of apotheosis. 


308 INTRODUCTION 


the solidarity and unity of the empire. Its political convenience, 
however, lent it increasing momentum. Gradually, on the worship 
of the Lares Augusti in Italy and the capital (Rushforth, pp. 59 f.) 
and on the association of the imperial cultus with that of dea Roma 
(to whom a temple had been erected at Smyrna as far back as 195 
B.c.), the new canonisation rose to its height, never jealous of local 
cults, but thriving by means of its adaptability to the religious syn- 
cretism of the age. It was the religious sanction of the new im- 
perialism.! It had temples, sacrifices, choirs (as at Smyrna), and 
even a priesthood (the sodales Augustales) of its own. 

For obvious reasons the cult flourished luxuriantly in the pro. 
vinces, particularly in Asia Minor,? where the emperor was often 
regarded as an incarnation of the local god or named before him. 
Distance lent enchantment to the provincial view of the emperor. 
Any sordid traits or idiosyncrasies retired into the background before 
the adoration felt for the divinity which hedged this unseen, powerful 
figure, who was hailed with a mixture of servility and real gratitude 
as ‘‘the Saviour,” “the Peace,” ‘the αὐτοκράτωρ ” of the world, or as. 
the lord of men (κύριος, dominus; cf. Kattenbusch, ii. pp. 612 f.). 
Asia Minor became a hotbed of the cultus. The mere recognition of 
an abstract empire with its authority providentially vested in the 
emperor passed often into a religious adulation of the latter, as θεός. 
(cf. Thieme’s Inschriften von Magnesia am Mdander u. das N.T., 
pp. 28 f.). The annual festival or diet of the nine Asiatic townships, 
which served as an organ of government throughout the province, 
readily coalesced with an annual festival in honour of the reigning 


1 Full investigations by Boissier (La Religion Romaine, i. 184 f.), Friedlander 
(iii. 455 f.), and Mr. B. W. Henderson (Nero, pp. 347 f., 434 f.), to be supplemented 
by Otto Hirschfeld’s essay in Sitzungsberichte d. Akademie d. Wissensch. zu Berlin 
(1888), 833 f, the articles in Roscher’s Griech. τι. Rom. Mythologie (ii. pp. 902-919) 
and in Prot. Real-Encykl. (1901), x. 539 f., Wendland’s Hellen.-Rémische Kultur in 
ihren Bezieh. zu μά. u. Christ. (1907), §§ 5 and 7, and especially by J. Toutain’s. 
pages on the cult of Roma (37 f.) and the spread of the imperial cultus generally 
(pp. 43 f.) in his notable work on Les cultes paiens dans l’Empire Romain (premiére 
partie, tome i. Paris, 1907). Popular sketches in English in L. Dyer’s Studies 
of the Gods in Greece (1891, pp. 37,45); Lecky’s History of European Morals (1. 257 
f.), Westcott’s Epistles of St. Fohn (235-269), Iverach H.#. (1906, 262 f.), Work- 
man’s Persecution in the Early Church (1906, pp. 94 f.), and Harnack’s Mission and 
Expansion of Christianity (1908), i. book ii. chap. ix. 

2 With the title of Jesus (ἣ ἀρχὴ τῆς κτίσεως τοῦ θεοῦ), in Apoc. iii. 14, con- 
trast the servile language of the decree issued (c. 9,B.c.) by the Asiatic κοινόν, fixing 
New Year’s Day as the emperor’s birthday: ἣν τῇ τῶν πάντων ἀρχῇ ἴσην δικαίως av 
εἶναι ὑπολάβοιμεν (τοῦτο αὐτῷ ἀρχὴν Tod βίου καὶ τῆς ζωῆς γενονέναι). Ch 
Dittenberger’s Ovientis Graeci Inscript. Selectae, 458. 


INTRODUCTION 309 


emperor (Mommsen, Provinces, i., 344 f.). The Asiarchs probably 
organised and pushed the new religion, even more than the local 
magistrates (cf. xiii. 11 f.). At any rate the cultus, attaching itself 
like mistletoe to institutions and local rites alike, shot up profusely ; 
polytheism found little trouble in admitting the emperor to a place 
beside the gods, and occasionally, as in the case of Augustus and 
Apollo, or of Domitian and Zeus, “the emperor was represented as 
the deity incarnate in human form” (C. B. P. i. 53 1). The islands 
also shared in this cult, as they had previously shared in the worship 
of the Ptolemies. At Thera, for example, a pagan altar has been 
found which was dedicated “to the almighty Caesar, the son of 
God” (contrast Apoc., ii. 18), This divi filius title was one of the 
most common and least conventional of what John called βλασφημίας 
ὀνόματα. 

The inevitable clash between this cult and the sensitive monothe- 
ism of Judaism was struck during the latter years of the insane 
madcap, Caligula (39-41 a.v.). His pretensions to divinity would have 
been ridiculous, if they had not been dangerous. But he deified 
himself in literal earnest by means of incense, gestures, and clothing 
(cf. Joseph. Antiq. xviii. 7-8, xix. 1-2 ; Suet. Calig. 22) ; and the climax 
of his insults to Judaism—the proposed erection of his statue in the 
temple at Jerusalem—was only averted by the prudent temporising of 
Petronius and the murder of the emperor himself. Under Claudius 
matters righted themselves. Still, the shock of the crisis (cf. Eus. 
H. E. ii. 5-6) left a deep impression on the conscience of the Jews. 
It revived the worst memories of Antiochus Epiphanes, and the dread 
remained, as Tacitus allows, that some other emperor might attempt 
what Caligula had failed in (cf. Spitta 490 f.). Echoes of this are tc 
be heard possibly in 2 Thess. and the synoptic apocalypse as well 
in Apoc. xiii., which (according to many critics)! is based upon a 
source either Christian (Erbes 19 f., Bruston, Briggs) or Jewish 
(Spitta, Pfleiderer, de Faye, O. Holtzmann, Rauch adding xvi. 
13-14, 16), dating from this period. On this view, the general tenor 


1 Otherwise, xii. 18 - xiii. 7 is held to contain a Jewish fragment (Kohler, J. Weiss), 
concluded in xix. 11-21, which dates from 70 a.p. Similarly Schmidt, Weyland. 
Wellhausen, and others (Neronic). ‘ Caligula’, in Hebrew (Gaskulgas = ἪΡ 


oid>0)) as in Greek (TAIOZ KAICAP) is equivalent by gematria to 616, the 
variant to which Irenzus objected (cf. on xiii. 18); but so is KAICAP @EOC 
(Deissmann: Licht vom Osten, 199 f.) as well as the shortened form of “ Nero Caesar” 
For a discussion of the Beast’s number, see the recent symposium by Clemen, 
Corssen, Bruston, and Vischer in Preuschen’s Zeitschrift fiir die neutest. Wiss. 
IQOI-1904. 

VOL: V, 20 


310 INTRODUCTION 


of the oracle required only a few alterations to render it applicable 
to the later situation, when Nero and Domitian had become for 
Christians what Caligula had been for the Jews half a century earlier. 
The arguments for this literary hypothesis, however, are not oxen 
strong enough to pull the plough (cf. notes on xiii.). 

Hitherto Christians had been out of the fray. Even Nero’s 
massacre of them was a freak of personal violence, justified by their 
reputation for hostility to the State, and apparently prompted by 
Jewish malevolence. It had nothing whatever to do with the imperial 
cultus. The latter was not seriously enforced until the second part 
of Domitian’s reign. Like Caligula’ formerly and Diocletian after- 
wards, this emperor (cf. Schoener, in Acta Semin. Philologici Erlang. 
1881, pp. 476 f.) laid claim to the title of dominus et deus, and though 
his claim was not official, it was none the less serious. Hence, 
while he proved a “" second Nero” to the Christians no less than to 
his own restive subjects, the former had special reasons for re- 
membering the reign of terror, 


‘** When Vespasian’s brutal son 
Cleared Rome of what most shamed him.” 


The strict and harsh enforcement of the poll-tax (Suet. Domit. 12) 
pressed heavily upon the Jews, indeed, but otherwise they were 
generally undisturbed, since normally, under the semi-tolerant policy 
of the empire, they were not obliged to erect or worship statues of the 
emperor (Joseph. Apion. ii. 6). They sacrificed for him, not to him. 
As a national religion, Judaism had its own rights like the rest.2. But 
Christianity was not a religio licita, and the Nazarene faith, by the 
sheer force ofits principles and the success of its contemporary propa- 
ganda, had soon to face the exercise of the law against illicit cults 
(especially when these refused the test of swearing by the emperor’s 
genius). The very differentiation of Christianity from Judaism, which 
hed become increasingly plain ever since Nero’s outburst, deprived the 


1 The bisellium, a splendid double throne, was assigned as a divine honour to 
Caligula alone after Caesar. Contrast Apoc. xxii. 1. 

2 They suffered under Domitian not for their personal faith but for the success of 
their propaganda in making proselytes; cf. S. Gsell’s Essai sur le Régne de 
l’Empereur Domitien, pp. 313 £ 

3 The most recent discussion is by Klette in Die Christen-Katastrophe unter Nero 
(1907; cf. the present writer’s review in H. $., 1908, 704-707). Renan’s coloured 
pages (pp. 124 f.) and Hausrath’s graphic outline (Hist. of N.T. Times. The Apostles 
iv. 168 f.) must be checked by the statements of Ramsay (Church in Roman Emfire, 
ch. xi.) and of Mr. B. W. Henderson in his Life and Principate of the Empere 
Nero (1903). 


INTRODUCTION 311 


former of its right to the shelter of the imperial aegis and rendered it 
liable to the religious and patriotic tax of the Caesar-worship which 
Domitian’s claim now emphasised. The growth of the new faith and 
the deepening need of the imperial cultus as a national bond of loyalty 
made a collision between the church and the State inevitable ; and, 
although no literary record exists of the opening movement in the 
campaign, the correspondence of Trajan and Pliny is now recognised 
pretty generally to presuppose an earlier stage in the policy of the 
empire towards Christianity—a stage most probably associated with 
the later years of Domitian (cf. Neumann’s der Rom. Staat u. die 
allgemeine Kirche bis auf Diocletian, 1890, i. pp. 7 f. 11-15). Then 
the conflict became more than sporadic (οἱ πολλοὶ ἐπὶ Δομετιανοῦ διωγμοί, 
Mart. Ign. 1). Domitian not only permitted but encouraged and 
enforced the payment of divine honours to himself; compliance with 
the rites of the Caesar cultus was made the convenient test of loyalty 
for Christians who had hitherto been arraigned for the most part upon 
criminal charges (flagitia cohaerentia nomint) such as anarchy ; 
confession of the Name of Christ now involved a refusal to give the 
emperor the name of deus or divus, and, as John put it, all who refused 
to worship the image of the beast or to be marked by his name were 
liable to death. The religious recusant was naturally suspected of 
lése majesté. When his religious susceptibilities were outraged by 
the quasi-deification of the emperor, his protest was viewed as a 
veiled pretext for rebellion, as well as an assertion of ἀθεότης or 
sacrilege (cf. for Domitian’s reign, Lightfoot’s Clem. Rom. i. pp. 104- 
115). But whether obstinatio or ἀθεότης or maiestas, the crime was 
visited with the same penalties. 

This conflict of loyalties is the business of the Apocalypse. At 


1 The connexion of the Apocalypse with this Domitianic phase is also worked out 
by A. Matthaei (Preussische F¥ahrb. 1905, 402-479) from the Roman standpoint. He 
argue: (477 f.) that the first θηρίον of ch. xiii. is the imperial cultus itself, while the 
second symbolises the provincial authorities especially in Asia Minor. Ramsay 
(Seven Letters, p. 97) partly agrees with the latter identification, taking the θηρίον 
of xiii. τα f. to mean “ the Province of Asia in its double aspect of civil and religious 
administration,” but the probability (see notes) is that the writer is thinking of the 
Asiatic priests of the imperial cultus, who may have played a part like that of the 
Buddhist and Taoist priests during the Boxer rising in China, or like that of the 
officials of the Russian Church in the recent campaign against the Milkist sectaries, 
It is noticeable that there is no Christian antithesis, in the way of priesthood, to 
Satan’s embodiment in the priesthood of the imperial cultus (xiii. 11 f.), whereas the 
latter in the sense of false prophet is implicitly contrasted with the true prophetic 
order of Christianity, as are the official ὑμνῳδοί of the cultus at Pergamos and else- 
where with the singers of hymns to God and Jesus in the Apocalypse. 


91 INTRODUCTION 


the first shock of persecution in Asia Minor over the principle of the 
imperial cultus, John grasped with moral power the truth that this 
was not a local skirmish but a matter of life or death to the church, 
The issue between ΚΥΡΙΟΣ IHCOYE and ΚΥΡΙΟΣ KAICAP was to be 
neither compromised nor confused; the worship of the emperor, 
even as a form of patriotism, and the adoration of Jesus as the 
Christ of God were incompatible. The State did not realise this 
until afterwards, when the dimensions and irrepressible vigour of the 
Christian movement revealed it as a menace to the older civilisation 
of the empire. As yet the Nazarene faith was little more than one 
of the numerous Oriental weeds which had to be rooted out as im- 
moral, anti-social, and unpatriotic; it was mainly notable for its 
tenacity of life. The State did not dream as yet of regarding these 
atheists and anarchists as a rival power. It was contemptuous. 
rather than distrustful of the new faith. That this sect within a 
sect, or rather this strugglmg offshoot of the Jewish superstition,,. 
would outlive the empire which treated it as the legions treated the 
daisies on their line of march, must have seemed then the infatuation 
of a narrow-minded fanatic. History, by justifying this expectation. 
has proved that it was more than a magnificent reach of the religious 
instinct, that it was in fact what men have agreed to label rather 
than define as “inspired”. It is true that the messianic and 
apocalyptic traditions, with which the prophet worked, tended to 
foreshorten his view of the campaign. The host of martyrs were 
not crowded into a brief interval, and the triumph of the church 
over the empire came in a very different way from what the prophet 
or any of his contemporaries imagined. But the Apocalypse pene- 
trated to the heart of the issue. The resolve which it knit and the 
hope which it kindled were substantially the faith which nerved the 
later church, from Ignatius and Polycarp onwards. What “ faithful- 
ness to death’”’ (cf. ii. 10) involved may be illustrated from the 
normal procedure of the pro-consul in Bithynia, where Pliny, as he 
tells us, had people brought before him who were accused, some- 
times anonymously and sometimes erroneously, of being Christians. 
They included persons of both sexes, all ages, and varying health. 
After being thrice warned, those who still adhered to their confes- 
sion of faith were, in consequence of the cognitio or preliminary 
investigation, either imprisoned and killed (if provincials, cf. Apoc. ii. 
13) or deported to Rome (if Roman citizens, cf. Apoc. xvii. 6, Ignatius, 
etc.). Others, however, were not so loyal to their Lord. When an. 


1 There were the δειλοὶ and ἄπιστοι, ¢.g., of Apoc. xxi. 8. Cowardice was par- 
ticularly dangerous on account of its infectious nature. For the bad example of the- 


INTRODUCTION 313 


. 


opportunity of recantation was offered, some denied any recent con- 
nexion with Christianity, telling the proconsul that they had been 
(some twenty years ago, 7.e., c. 93 a.D., the period of the Apocalypse), 
but no longer were, Christians. Some also had no objection to offer 
incense before the image of the emperor or to curse publicly the 
name of Christ. This was the criterion applied to the suspect,! and 
it was largely due to the propagation of such resolute ideas as are 
expounded in the Apocalypse that Christians were kept loyal to their 
faith, and that, without a tear in their eye or a sword in their hand, 
they were able eventually to change the face of the world by enforc- 
ing the recognition of their claims at the hands of the empire. Like 
the conventicles of the Scottish Covenanters, the primitive Christian 
churches were accused of immoraiity and sedition, but, unlike 
them, they succeeded by passive resistance pure and simple. The 
Apocalypse is a call to arms, but the arms are only patience and 
loyalty to conviction.? 

It is unnecessary to assume that any widespread persecution 
under Domitian, or indeed any “persecution” in the later and 
technical sense of the term, was before the prophet’s mind, in order 
to account for the language and spirit of the Apocalypse. John 
himself had only been banished or imprisoned, like some of his 
friends (ii. 10, Clem. Rom. ix. and cf. on i. 9). But from the position 
of matters he already argued the worst. The few cases of repres- 
sive interference and of martyrdom in Asia Minor (and elsewhere) 


δειλοὶ spies, cf. Joseph. Antiq., iii. 15, 1. Ep. Lugd. describes ten renegades ‘‘ who 
occasioned us much grief and immeasurable sorrow and impaired the ready zeal of 
those who had not yet been arrested”. ‘Some remained ἔξω (cf. Apoc. xxi. 8, xxii. 
15), ot μηδὲ ἴχνος πώποτε πίστεως, μηδὲ αἴσθησιν ἐνδύματος νυμφικοῦ, μηδὲ 
ἔννοιαν φόβου θεοῦ σχόντες (cf. Apoc. xi. 18). 

1 Pliny’s idea of repentance was that Christians should give up their faith. He 
thought that a number would be willing to recant if they got the opportunity, and 
Trajan confirmed his suggestion by ordering that whoever denies himself to be a 
Christian and makes that plain by his actions, t.e., by worshipping our gods, shall 
gain forgiveness. Contrast Apoc. ix. 20, xvi.g f. At Vienne and Lyons the Roman 
citizens in the church were beheaded (cf. Apoc. xx. 4, and the cases of John the 
Baptist and James, Ac. xii. 1). The rest were thrown to the wild beasts or tortured 
to death in other ways. It must always be remembered that μάρτυς, in its sombre 
sense, did not necessarily imply that a Christian had suffered the death-penalty (cf. 
Tert. de Fuga 12, Eus. H. E. v. 18, etc.). 

2 Cf. xiii. το, xiv. 12. In spite of the Cameronian touch of xiii. 17, this is the 
normal temper of the book; it is a Christian expression of the passivity shown 
already by the Quietists in Judaism, but the controlling motive is the spirit of Jesus 
as recorded in his own saying (Matt. xxii. 21) and in the reply of his relatives to 
Domitian (Eus. H. E., ii. 32): ‘‘ His kingdom is not of this world or of this earth, 
but heavenly and angelic, to arrive at the consummation of this age”. 


314 INTRODUCTION 


were enough to warn him of the storm rolling up the sky, though as 
yet only one or two drops had actually fallen. Eusebius probably 
exaggerates when he speaks of “many others” along with Clemens 
and Domitilla (iii. 18), and the period of terror was admittedly short 
(H. E., xx. 9-11, cf. Tert. Apol. 5), but the crisis was sufficiently 
acute to open John’s mind to the issues at stake. It is this sense 
of the irreconcilable antagonism between the imperial cultus and 
Christianity, not any specific number of martyrdoms, which accounts 
for the origin of the Apocalypse during the latter years of Domitian. 
A cursory glance will show that its language presupposes a situation 
more definite and serious than any covered by earlier references to 
persecution for The Name or My Name, which in all likelihood, as 
1 Peter indicates, obtained more or less generally after the crisis of 
64 A.D. in Rome. John sees another name set up against the name 
of Christ, and he stamps it as the essence of blasphemy to recognise 
any such title. What Christians were summoned by him to do was 
to say ‘‘No”. Their positive confession of the Christian name re- 
solved itself practically into a refusal to admit the legitimacy of the 
emperor’s divine names. 

This power of penetrating to the eternal issues underneath the 
conflict of the day is one note of the true prophet, and in touching 
the Apocalypse we touch the living soul of Asiatic Christendom. 
The book comes forward as a work of prophecy (cf. notes on i. 1, 
3; xi. 18; xviii. 20, 24; xxii. 6-7, etc.). As such it is designed for 
the instruction and encouragement of the Christian society (1 Cor. 
xiv. 3f.). It fulfils this design by means of visions depicting (a) the 
approach and certainty of the Christ’s return, (b) the warnings 
and comfort of God for the churches during the interval, and (c) 
the bliss and terror of the world to come. Ordinarily the revela- 
tion takes the form of rapture or vision. This, again, may pass 
into an address in which the prophet leaves the véle of seer for that of 
spiritual adviser. Or, rhapsody may become a song (ψαλμός), reflecting 
the antiphonal outbursts of melody (Ε. Bz. 2138-2140, 3242) in the con- 
gregation (cf. the responsive Amen in v. 14, vii. 12, the Trisagion in 
iv. 8, and the Hallelujah in xix. 1 f.) which were based in part upon 
earlier Jewish psalms of the synagogue (as Pliny found in Bithynia: 
“‘carmen Christo quasi deo dicere secum inuicem”). Finally, the 
prophet may work along the lines of traditional apocalyptic oracles 
which were more or less familiar to his hearers, just as the author 
of Daniel took Jeremiah’s seventy weeks as one of his texts. All 
these varieties are represented in the Apocalypse of John. But, 
whatever réle he assumes, the seer or speaker is pre-eminently a 


INTRODUCTION. - 315 


prophet, and the Christian prophet is ranked beside Moses and the 
angels as the servant of God κατ᾽ ἐξοχήν. The order of prophets is 
second only to the apostles. 

If it is the vocation of the prophet to reveal and emphasise the 
faith, it is the corresponding duty of the martyr to be loyal at all 
costs to that faith in the killing times. Hence the martyr or con- 
fessor is, next to the prophet, the most prominent figure in the 
landscape of the Apocalypse. One of the tests proposed (most un- 
fairly) by an anti-Montanist in the second century as a criterion of 
Montanist prophecy was its capacity for producing martyrs. Did it 
inspire a faith equal to the stress of persecution? Was the religion 
it fostered strenuous enough to provoke persecution? The crisis of 
the imperial cultus under Domitian seemed to John at any rate to 
demand an attitude of passive resistance! on the part of Christians 
which involved the risk of death. Neither rebellion nor suicide was 
to be contemplated as a means of escape, and flight was out of the 
question. Whither could one flee from the Caesar? The Christian 
must be prepared to be faithful unto death, and if there is any dis- 
tinction among Christians drawn by the prophet’s mind it lies not 
between Jewish and Gentile Christians, but between the m&rtyrs on 
the one hand and the rank and file of the church upon the other. 
The martyr is primus inter pares ; an exceptional place and space 
is assigned him for his persistent fidelity. At the same time the 
extravagant prerogatives of the martyrs and the confessors in later 
Christian belief lie outside the purview of the Apocalypse. The 
prophet’s homage to them is partly due to the exceptional circum- 
cumstances of the ‘“‘killing”” time, and the permanent element un- 
derlying it is the truth (witnessed by Zoroastrianism in its own way, 
cf. Encycl. Rel. and Ethics, i. 210) that history is neither caprice 
nor blind fate, but a moral order in which sacrifice for the sake of 
Christ and loyalty to God are not water spilt upon the ground—a 
moral order, too, whose end is bound up with the person of Jesus 
Christ as Lord and Redeemer. It was perhaps inevitable that the 
expression of this great religious conception should, by its very 
emphasis, lead to some exaggeration. The flood-tide which sub- 
merges some truths isolates others in a position of abnormal pro- 
minence. Thus the Apocalypse, which is a tract for the bad times 
of persecution, views the philosophy of history as catastrophe rather 


1 With xiii. 9-10 compare the Jewish high-priest’s prayer on the day of atone- 
ment (Jer. Jom. v. 42 c.), that ‘‘neither this day nor through this year may any 
captivity come upon us. . . . And as for Thy people Israel, let no enemy exalt him- 
self against them.” 


316 INTRODUCTION 


than as growth; the virtues of asceticism and even celibacy (cf. on 
xiv. 4) acquire unwonted prominence ; sensuous aspects of the mes- 
sianic reign tend to predominate; the impulse of propaganda is 
checked by the sombre and fore-shortened view of the world which 
the presentiment of approaching judgment fostered ; religion tends 
to be bound up with a hatred and fear of the civil power;! and 
God is a dazzling, silent, enthroned figure of majesty, who has men 
warned and wounded, not (as in the fourth gospel) a Father who 
is in direct touch with his children upon earth. The passion for 
moral retribution regards material and political convulsions more 
and more as the proper dynamic of providence. To John’s eyes, 
the cause of affairs in the empire of his day was running straight to 
the edge ofa precipice. He saw in history not any τύχη Or εἱμαρμένη 
but the justice and irony of providence abroad, and his puritanic 
temper expressed itself in a mixture of spiritual resignation with an 
imperious and vindictive expectation :— 
Rome shall perish! write that word 
In the blood that she has spilt. 

This expectation is only a heightened form of the traditional 
belief (cf. 4th Esd. xii. 11 ἔν, Apoc. Bar. iv. 4-5) that the fourth 
kingdom of Daniel’s vision was the Roman empire, which was to 
be overthrown at the advent of messiah’s reign. Josephus pru- 
dently evades this interpretation, though he is well aware of it. His 
business, he protests, is not to explain the future (Antiq. x. 10, 4). 
But the interpretation was widespread in apocalyptic circles, and 
a Christian had special reasons for sharing it. John expresses it 
with characteristic vigour. He will encourage no fifth-monarchy 
tendencies among Christians in Asia Minor, but he has no word 
of showing loyalty to the empire as distinguished from worshipping 
the emperor. He makes no attempt, such as Agrippa made before 
Caligula (Leg. ad Gaium, 36), to disprove the charge of treason, and 
no considerations of patriotism qualify his threats of doom against 
the Roman empire.? 

1Tt cannot be too strongly insisted that the tone of the Apocalypse here was 
neither normal nor final. Indeed the subsequent history of the church bears out this 
verdict. The Asiatic idiosyncrasies of its eschatology, and above all of its relation 
to the State are thrown into relief against the ‘‘loyalist” tone of a contemporary 
Roman writing like that of Clemens Romanus. The moderation of this fine 
epistle is attributed by Lightfoot (Clem. Rom.., i. pp. 27 f. 60 f. 382 f.) to the fact that 
its author and bearers were connected with the imperial household. 

? Dr. Selwyn actually conjectures (pp. 124 f.) that the prophet was banished for 
having written the seditious oracles of iv.-xxii., and that when he re-edited the work 


(adding i.- ii.) during Galba’s reign it was only the strong anti-Neronic feeling at 
Ephesus which saved him from capital punishment as a traitor (pp. 214 f.). 


INTRODUCTION 317 


8. 7. The Date—When the motive of the Apocalypse is thus 
found in the pressure upon the Christian conscience exerted by 
Domitian’s emphasis of the imperial cultus, especially as that was 
felt in Asia Minor, any earlier date for the book becomes almost 
impossible (cf. Mommsen’s Provinces of Rom. Empire, ii.175f.). The 
traditional alternative, z.c., the reign of Claudius, is absurd. The 
Neronic date (z.¢., soon after Nero’s death) exerts most of its fasci- 
nation on those who cling to too rigid a view of the book’s unity, 
which prevents them from looking past passages like xi. 1 f. and xvii. 9 f. 
But (a) the phase of the Nero-redivivus myth which is represented in 
the Apocalypse cannot be earlier than at least the latter part of Ves- 
‘pasian’s reign ; (Ὁ) the church of Smyrna, as we know from Polycarp 
(ad Phil. xi.) was not founded by 64 a.p., and it is impossible to crush 
the development implied in 11. 8-11 into a few years; (c) the con- 
ception of the new Jerusalem implies a post-70 date (cf. notes on 
XXi.-xxii.) ; (4) no worship of the emperor, adequate to explain the 
data of the Apocalypse, was enforced under Nero; and (e) the 
allusions to the martyrs (ii. 13, and especially vi. 10-11—the How 
long ? of the Neronic victims, and their subsequent comrades in 
martyrdom) surely presuppose a much longer period than three or 
four years. Por recent English statements of the Neronic date, see 
Selwyn (pp. 215 f.) and Mr. B. W. Henderson (of. cit. pp. 439 f.). 
‘The Vespasianic date (cf. V. Bartlet, Apostolic Age, 388-408 ; Scott, 
48-56), which has rather a better case in the internal evidence of the 
‘book, is ruled out of court by (d). The lack of any traditional re- 
ference to persecution under this emperor would not indeed be a 
‘decisive argument by itself; it is only by the letters of Pliny that we 
happen to know anything of the troubles experienced by Asiatic 
Christians under Trajan, and a similar outburst under Vespasian 
might have passed unnoticed by Christian or pagan writers. But 
this is unlikely.1 In any case, Vespasian did not take his inherited 
and official divinity seriously. Christians had a temporary and com- 
parative immunity under him, and “so rapidly did their influence 
grow that they even made converts in the imperial family itself” (cf. 
Lightfoot, Clem. Rom. ii. 507). Parts of the Apocalypse, taken 
‘singly (e.g., in xiii.), might be referred to Vespasian’s reign, but, 
unlike Domitian, he does not seem to have interfered with Oriental 

1 An even stronger term might be used, in view of the researches by critics like 
Matthaei, Gsell, Neumann and Ramsay. The extreme unlikelihood of the Apoca- 
lypse being elicited by anything during the reigns of Titus or Vespasian is also recog- 
nised by Linsenmayer in his Bekdmpfung des Christentums durch den rémischen 
-Staat (1905), pp. 66 f. 


318 INTRODUCTION 


cults. Thus, since the general intensity of John’s language about 
martyrdom cannot be explained altogether as either a reminiscence 
of the Neronic outburst or as a prophetic anticipation of what was to 
be expected at the hands of the world-power during the latter days— 
for some concrete occasion is necessary to account for the prophet’s 
standpoint—the most probable solution is that Christians were 
being persecuted here and there in Asia Minor for what Domitian 
(as Neumann and others rightly point out) regarded as a cardinal 
offence, viz., the refusal to acknowledge him as the divine head of the 
empire. The religious development of the churches is often held to 
presuppose a considerable length of time, but this argument must be 
used with caution. Worldliness and error and uncharitable feelings 
did not require decades to spring up in the primitive churches of 
Asia Minor and elsewhere. No great stress can be laid on this 
feature. Still, the character of the heresies described in ii.-iii, cer- 
tainly presupposes an acquaintance with incipient gnosticism which 
requires a later period than 70 a.p. for its development. 


The one passage (apart from vi. 6, where see note) which appears 
to be a water-mark of the date is unfortunately ambiguous (see 
notes on xvii.), as it contains an earlier Vespasianic source. But in 
xvii. 10-11 so much at least seems clear. The numbers are literal. 
not symbolical. The reckoning probably begins with Augustus as. 
the first emperor; the three usurpers (Galba, Otho and Vitellius) are 
passed over (cf. Suet. Vesp. 1: rebellione trium principum et caede 
incertum diu et quasi uagum imperium suscepit firmauitque tandem 
gens Flavia), as was only natural to a provincial, who would be 
specially apt to regard their struggle as a brief nightmare. The 
sixth and reigning emperor (6 εἷς ἔστιν) is Vespasian (69-79 a.p.), 
with whom the Flavian dynasty took up the imperial succession, 
after Nero’s death, which ended the Julian dynasty, had well-nigh 
broken up the empire (cf. xiii. 3 f.). Vespasian’s successor (Titus, 
79-81 A.D.) is to have a very brief reign.! As a matter of fact it only 
lasted for a couple of years. After him, the deluge! Nero-redi- 
vivus (τὸ θηρίον), incorporating the full Satanic power of the empire, 
who had already reigned on earth (ὃ qv) but who meanwhile was 


1 This might be (a) a uaticinium ex euentu, or (b) an eschatological inference (a 
writer, composing under the sixth emperor of a series which was only to number 
seven, would naturally argue that, as the end was near, the seventh emperor could 
not have long to reign), or (c) a reflection of the widespread feeling (cf. Schiller’s. 
Gesch. d. Rom, Kaiserzeit, i. 520) that the poor health of Titus would not permit him 
to reign for very long. 


INTRODUCTION 319 


invisible (kat οὐκ ἔστιν) was to reappear from the abyss, only to be 
crushed finally (kai εἰς ἀπώλειαν ὑπάγει). In its present form the 
oracle announces that the downfall of the empire is to be heralded 
by the reappearance after Titus of one belonging to the seven em- 
perors (ἐκ τῶν ἑπτά ἐστιν) who, on the traditional scheme of the 
heads, were to see the rise and ruin of the State. Here a literary 
problem of some nicety emerges, for, while ver. 10 implies the reign 
of Vespasian, ver. 11 points to an eighth emperor (evidently Do- 
mitian). The solution is either that the writer of both throws 
himself back in thought into Vespasian’s age, representing history 
under the form of apocalyptic prophecy, or that ver. 11 (Domitian 
recalling and playing the part of Nero) represents a later addition,' 
inserted in order to bring the source up to date. In either case 
the final standpoint is Domitianic, however, and this tallies with the 
general evidence of the rest of the book.” 

It also tallies with second-century tradition. In describing the 
persecution of Christians by Domitian, that worthy successor of Nero, 
Eusebius (H. Ε. iii. 18) quotes the following words from Irenaeus on 
the name of Antichrist ; εἰ δὲ ἔδει ἀναφανδὸν ἐν τῷ νῦν καιρῷ κηρύττεσθαι 
τοὔνομα αὐτοῦ, δι᾿ ἐκείνου ἄν ἐρρέθη τοῦ καὶ τὴν ἀποκάλυψιν ἑορακότος. οὐδὲ 
γὰρ πρὸ πολλοῦ χρόνου ἑωράθη, ἀλλὰ σχεδὸν ἐπὶ τῆς ἡμετέρας γενεᾶς, πρὸς τῷ 
τέλει τῆς Δομετιανοῦ ἀρχῆς. The attempts to turn the force of this pass- 
age by supposing that Irenaeus confounded Domitian’s actual reign 
with his temporary regency in 70 .p., or by referring ἑωράθη to the seer 
instead of to the vision, are ingenious but quite unconvincing. The 
tradition must be taken as it stands. Originally, as πρὸς τῷ τέλει 


1‘* To me it seems that there are two distinct notes of time in the passage, 
and that we are almost compelled to suppose that what was written at one 
date has been adapted to another” (Dr. Sanday in Fourn. Theol. Studies, viii. 
492). 

2 This kind of elusive, enigmatic reckoning is illustrated by the Jewish Domitianic 
apocalypse in 4 Esd. iii-.xiv. and by Barn. iv. Inthe former, the Roman empire is 
an eagle with three heads (i.e. the Flavian dynasty: Vespasian, Titus, and 
Domitian), the first of which rules the earth oppressively, the second of which is 
devoured by the third (alluding to the belief that Domitian had made away with his 
brother), while the third is to be challenged and vanquished by messiah (a parallel to 
John’s prediction). The Christian writing, in order to prove the nearness of the end, 
quotes Dan. vii. 7-8 and 24 for the purpose of showing that from the beast (t.e. the 
Roman empire) ten horns were to spring (i.e. the Caesars from Julius to Vespasian or 
Domitian) and from them a little horn by way of excrescence (παραφυάδιον, te. 
Nero antichrist) which will abase three of the great horns (i.e. the Flavian dynasty) 
Similarly Daniel’s addition of the 11th horn to the traditional ro illustrates John’s 
apocalyptic revisal of the 7 heads. The only σοφία of the Apocalypse is the knack 
of solving puzzles in this province of religious arithmetic (xiii. 18, xvii. 9). 


320 INTRODUCTION 


suggests, it was more precise and extended. It was held by Hip- 
polytus, Clement of Alexandria, Jerome, and Victorinus, possibly 
even by Hegesippus at an earlier date, if Dr. Lawlor is correct in his 
argument (f¥ourn. Theol. Studies, viii. 436 f.) that the statements of 
Eusebius (H. E. iii. 11-20) were borrowed from that writer's Hypom- 
nemata ; indeed, no other early tradition has anything like the same 
support or plausibility. Irenaeus, of course, is no great authority by 
himself on matters chronological, but he is reporting here what 
there was no obvious motive for inventing. The internal and the 
external evidence thus converge upon the latter part of the reign of 
Domitian as the period of the book’s composition or publication. 
Little more than half a century later, one of its first commentators, 
bishop Melito of Sardis, protested to Marcus Aurelius that “ of all 
the emperors it was Nero and Domitian alone who, at the instigation 
of certain slanderous persons,” assailed the Christian church (so 
Lact. De Morte Persec. 3). Whether Melito knew this indepen- 
dently of the Apocalypse or not, we need have very little hesita- 
tion (cf. Stephan Gsell’s Essai sur le régne de l’Empereur Domitien, 
1894, pp. 307 f.) in collating this persecution with the book in 
question. 

8. 8. The Author.—The settlement of the date clears up the 
problem of the authorship to this extent, that it confirms the 
disjunctive canon of Dionysius (cf. Liicke, ὃ § 39-42; Simcox 
xxili. f. xxxiii. f.), Origen’s thoughtful pupil, who saw, upon grounds 
of internal evidence, that it was impossible for the Apocalypse 
and the Fourth Gospel to have come from the same pen. Were 
the Apocalypse dated earlier, it could be supposed that John had 
matured during the interval, since twenty or twenty-five years’ 
residence in a Greek city might be conjectured to have improved 
his style and widened his outlook. But when the Apocalypse has 
to be dated in the same decade as the Fourth Gospel, the hypothesis 
of a single author collapses. While the data of vocabulary, style, 
and thought suggest that both writings originated in a school or 
circle of Asiatic Christians, they differentiate the one book from the 
other unambiguously.! 

Hardly any writing in the New Testament loses so little, or gains 
so much, by translation as the Apocalypse, for almost any version 


1 Recent, though rather extreme, statements are to be found in J. Réville’s Le 
Quatr. Evangile (1901), pp. 26-47, 333 f. in Selwyn (pp. 81 f. 114 f., 222 f., 258 f,, the 
Fourth Gospel = a correction not only of the synoptists but of the Apocalypse), and 
in Schmiedel’s article (E.B. ii. ii. 2515-2518). As Alford admits, ‘‘the Greek of the 
Gospel and Epistle is not that of the Apocalypse in a maturer state”. 


INTRODUCTION 321 


serves to obliterate most of the exceptionally numerous and glaring 
irregularities of its syntax. But one drawback of this advantage 
is that the distinctive characteristics of the book are less vividly 
felt ; the further one goes from the original, the less visible are those 
idiosyncrasies of conception, style, and construction which mark off 
the Apocalypse from the rest of the early Christian literature and 
notably from the Fourth Gospel. The psychological difference by 
itself should not be pressed too far. One has only to recollect men 
like Samuel Rutherford and Keble, to understand how vindictiveness 
to religious opponents is compatible with a sweet and even devout 
spiritual tone in certain natures. But the disjunctive canon in the 
present case proceeds from a wider induction. Thus 6.5. the well- 
known resemblances of the Lamb and the Logos are both specious and 
secondary. The former (τὸ ἀρνίον Apoc. ; ὃ ἀμνὸς τοῦ θεοῦ, Gospel, ἀρνίον 
being reserved for Christians) does not exist in the original, nor is it 
peculiar to the Johannine literature. The latter again (ὁ λόγος τ. θεοῦ, 
Apoc. ; ὃ λόγος, Gospel) is verbal (cf. note on xix. 13); the two ideas 
are adapted from totally different soils in pre-Christian Judaism 
and for alien ends. Some closer analogies, such as (a) the relation 
of God, Christ, and the believer (cf. on ii. 27, iii. 19 f.), (b) the use of 
the partitive ἐκ, ἵνα, δείκνυμι (of revelation), etc., (c) the explanation of 
Hebrew terms, (4) formulas like μετὰ ταῦτα, and (6) phrases about 
witnessing or keeping God’s word (commandments), do not neces- 
sarily imply more than a common milieu of thought and expression 
such as contemporary writers belonging to the same school might | 
naturally employ. A common religious dialect often produces similar 
instances of corresponding or coincident expression in different 
authors of the same period. On the other hand, the Apocalypse has 
a vocabulary of its own, whose peculiarities are not to be explained 
simply from the subject matter ; ¢.g. δοῦλοι θεοῦ (in explicit contrast to 
Joh. xv. 15), λατρεύειν, οἰκουμένη, παντοκράτωρ, πίστις, ὑπομονή, etc. 
besides cases of the multiplied genitive (xiv. 8, etc.). It ignores many 
favourite and even characteristic terms of the Fourth evangelist, e.g. 
ἀλήθεια, ἀληθής, ἀληθῶς, ἀπεκρίθη κ. εἶπεν, ἀφιέναι τὰς ἁμαρτίας, θεᾶσθαι, 
ἴδε, ἴδιος, καθὼς, μετὰ τοῦτο, πάντοτε, παρρησία, πώποτε, ὑψοῦσθαι, χάρα» 
sonship (cf. on xxi. 7) asking (épwrdw) God, darkness, μὲν. .. δέ, 
μένειν (except in xvii. 10, historically), πονηρός or ἄρχων τοῦ κόσμου (of the 
devil), to be of God or to be born of God, love to God or Christ, 
ὑπέρ with genitive, ἀντί, ὑπό (accus.), μέντοι, etc., etc. Even where the 
Apocalypse uses certain terms or ideas of the Fourth Gospel, it is in 
a different sense; ¢.g. αἰώνιος (only in xiv. 6, never with ζωή), light 
and the world (physically not spiritually), éxetvos (never substantival), 


329 INTRODUCTION 


ἐμός (only once), οὖν of logical appeal?! (not of historical transition), 
ἹἹερουσαλήμ. not Ἱεροσόλυμα, νικᾶν (never transitive, and in special sense 
cf. on ii. 7), judgment (outward and dramatic, not inward), the Spirit 
(wholly prophetic, in contrast to the inward Comforter of the Gos- 
pel), σημαίνειν, ὑπάγειν, etc. Furthermore, the Fourth Gospel ignores, 
often deliberately, a large number of words or phrases used not only 
by the Apocalypse (once at least) but by the earlier synoptic Gospels ; 
e.g. ἀἄναγινώσκω (of Scriptures), ἀποδίδωμι, ἀπόστολοι, ἄρσην, ἀφαιρέω, 
βασανίζειν, βδέλυγμα, βίβλος, γαστήρ, γρηγορεῖν, γυνή (wife), δαιμόνια, 
δένδρον, διαθήκη, δίκαιος (Of men), δῶρον, ἔθνη (-- Gentiles), εἰκών, ἔλαιον, 
ἐνδύειν, ἑπτά, ἐσθίω, ἔσχατος, ἔσωθεν (ἔξωθεν), εὐαγγέλιον (cf. on xiv. 6), 
ἑξήκοντα, ἐχθρός, ἥλιος, θρόνος, ἰσχύς, ἰσχυρός, κληρονομεῖν, κλίνη, κηρύσσειν, 
κόπτω, λιμός, λοιπός, λυχνία, μακρόθεν, μαρτύριον, μάρτυς, μηδείς, μετρέω, 
μικροί, μυστήριον, νεφέλη, ὀλίγος, ὀμνύειν, ὀδούς, οὐαί, οὖς (contrast John 
xviil. 10, 26), πάσχω, πατάσσειν, περί (accus.), πέτρα, πίστις, πλοῦτος (-σιος), 
ποτίζειν, πόλεμος, πρεσβύτεροι, προσευχή, πρόσωπον, ῥάβδος, ῥίζα, σεισμός, 
σελήνη, σκηνή, σοφία, σταυρόω, σφόδρα, ὑψηλός, φυλακή, ψευδοπροφήτης, and 
χήρα. The Apocalypse also substitutes ἔρχου for ἐλθέ, and uses phrases 
like ἄξιος with infin. for ἄξιος with ἵνα. The eschatological differences 
of conception, which are too patent to require comment or to admit of 
harmonising, corroborate the impression made by this argument from 
words. Such features, linguistic and mental (cf. e.g. oni. 4, ii. 7, 
lil. 21, vii. 15), are not due to literary versatility, nor to an imaginary 
growth in the same writer’s vocabulary and soul, ‘nor even to a 
common editorial revision. The argument from solecisms (cf. § 1) 
and regular irregularities of style, from the special vocabulary, and 
above all from the realistic type of religious feeling, may be cumula- 
tive, but it is none the less able to support the contention that whilst 
the Fourth Gospel and the Apocalypse must have sprung from the 
same circle of Asiatic Christianity, they could not have been written 
by the same person within a few years of each other ; the divergences 
of eschatology, angelology, and Christology—which represent the 
crucial points of comparison between the two books—are almost as 
clearly cut in Apoc. i.-iii., where the Apocalypse is least apocalyptic, 
as in the later oracles. In general, it would not be irrelevant to 
apply to the Fourth Gospel and the Apocalypse the terms used by 
Dionysius of Halicarnassus to characterise the works of Herodotus 
and Thucydides respectively ; the one is radiant (ἱλαρόν), the other is 
awe-inspiring (φοβερόν). 

1 This is particularly significant, since, as the Apocalypse “is largely made up of 


narrative, we might have expected narrative οὖν in abundance if it had been written 
by the hand that wrote the Fourth Gospel” (Abbott, ¥ohk. Grammar, p. 479). 


INTRODUCTION ἡ) 323 


While the author of the Apocalypse cannot have been the author 
of the Fourth Gospel, his personality is partially disclosed by the 
internal evidence of the book, which shows that it was the work of 
a Jewish Christian prophet called John (i. 1, 9, etc.) who was in 
close touch with the Asiatic churches. It is a προφητεία, and as such 
it is ranked by the first Christian writer of the second century who 
definitely mentions it (cf. Justin’s Dial., 81, 82). It was intended 
to be read aloud in the worship! of those Christian congregations, 
primarily but not exclusively, to which its opening messages were 
addressed. In reality it isa sort of catholic epistle as it stands (cf. 
ii. 7, etc., xxii. 16, 21), an open letter or manifesto to the churches. 
The authority claimed by John is that of a prophet, not of an 
apostle. The seven Asiatic communities may have lain within his 
circuit or diocese, but the data of Apoc. ii.-iii. do not suggest any 
specifically concrete relations between the prophet and the churches. 
He does not seem to have founded any of them, nor does he promise 
to re-visit them. Upon the other hand, John claims no special re- 
lation to Jesus Christ, and there is no distinct evidence that he had 
been an eye-witness of Jesus the messiah upon earth. None of the 
visions implies any such personal intimacy; indeed that of i. 9 f. 
tells against it, for the apocalyptic categories which dominate the 
opening vision are not such as might be expected from one who had 
been among the Galilean disciples.2— It may be replied that an 
apocalypse is not a gospel, and that in an apocalypse it was the 
qualities of a προφήτης which would naturally be prominent. But 
this only raises the further psychological problem: how should a 
primitive disciple adopt such categories? The reference in xvii. 20 
does not absolutely exclude the possibility of John having been an 
apostle, for ἀπόστολος is here employed in its wider sense, and in any 
case the addition of προφῆται shows that this προφήτης might have 
equally well referred objectively to the class or order to which he 


1 Passages like i. 3, ii. 7, etc., xiii. 9, 18, xxii. 7, reflect this ecclesiastical use, 
while the explanatory comments in iv. 5 (ἅ εἰσιν .. . θεοῦ), v. 6 (ot εἰσιν . . - γῆν); 
ν. 8 (ἅ εἰσιν .. . ἁγίων), xviii. 24, xix. 8 (τὸ yap .. . ἐστίν), xix. 10 (ἡ yap... 
προφητείας), xix. 13 (kal κέκληται .. . θεοῦ), xx. 14 (οὗτος . . . πυρός), sound 
often like prose glosses which in some cases may have been inserted by the author 
himself or a general editor, but in others were probably due to the interpretative 
reading in the churches. A partial analogy is furnished by the influence of the 
players on the text of Shakespeare’s plays. 

2 The seer never says, I saw the Lord Fesus, or, Behold, the Lord Fesus. 
Contrast Acts vii. 55, 56, etc. ‘‘ Jesus speaks through His Spirit under various forms 
or without any form, and is never beheld in the form He wore in Galilee ” (Abbott, 
p. 214). Cf. Prof. A. 5. Peake, in Mansfield College Essays (1909), pp. 89-106. 


324 INTRODUCTION 


belonged. The unique allusion in xxi. 14 to the twelve apostles of 
the Lamb, however, has an objective and retrospective tinge, which, 
though it does not absolutely rule out apostolic authorship, points 
in that direction. It is not a subtle anti-Pauline touch, for even 
Paul did not number himself among the twelve (1 Cor. xv. 5), but 
when it is collated with such discrepancies as that between xi. 1-2 
and Mk. xiii. 2 (cf. also iii, 21 with Mk. x. 37-40) or that between Ac. 
i. 6-8 and the apocalyptic calculations of the end (see further, on 
iii, 21, vii. 1-3, 14, ix. 15) the result is a cumulative argument in 
favour of some primitive Christian who sat looser to the synoptic 
tradition than a disciple such as the son of Zebedee would have 
done. During last century the apostolic authorship of the book, 
in conjunction with the Neronic date, was urged by Baur (cf. Church 
Hist. of First Three Centuries, i. 84 f., 153 ἢ.) and his school, on the 
double ground that it represented a type of narrow Jewish Christi- 
anity in the apostolic church, and that it contained an overt polemic 
against the apostle Paul. Neither of these arguments is seaworthy 
at the present day, although the anti-Pauline reference becomes a 
much more serious question, when the Nero or Galba date is 
chosen, than some recent defenders of the latter hypothesis appear 
to realise. The Apocalypse has the Pauline teaching behind it 
‘cf. iti, 14, xxii. 17), but it neither reproduces any of the Pauline 
idiosyncrasies nor opposes Paul personally. It goes back to the 
popular Jewish Christianity of the primitive churches, whose 
‘“‘theology’’ consisted primarily in a belief that Jesus, the true 
messiah, had secured the forgiveness of sins for his people and 
would return presently to establish the divine βασιλεία. The writer 
ignores any problem of the law or of the resurrection of the body. 
Echoes of the synoptic tradition are audible enough, particularly of 
its Lucan form, and one feature of the teaching of Jesus is preserved 
carefully, viz., the belief in the catastrophic advent of the βασιλεία ; 
but no evidence is available to prove a literary filiation between it 
and any of the synoptic gospels. 


1 So far as the local colour is not derived from O.T. traditions, it may be ascribed, 
as, e.g., by Mr. Theodore Bent (Nineteenth Century, 1888, 813-881, cf. also His- 
torical New Testament , p. 688) to a personal acquaintance with Palestine and Asia 
Minor (see on iv. 2, vi. 12 f., viii. 8 f., ix. 16, 18, xxii. 2). Thus, e.g¢., the references 
to the appearance or the disappearance (cf. the case of Chrysé near Lemnos, told 
by Pausanias, viii. 33-4) of islands reflect the insular situation of Patmos, from 
which several of the AZgean islands were at least visible (Tozer: Islands of the 
Aegean, pp. 178-95), as well as the volcano of Santorin. The crater of some Medi- 
terranean volcano may have lent special point to the lake of fire and brimstone. 
But John’s imagination is stronger than his susceptibility to his environment, though 


INTRODUCTION 325 


Who was this John? Was he some otherwise unknown figure 
(ἄλλον τινα τῶν ἐν ᾿Ασίᾳ γενομένων, Dionysius) in the primitive church 
of Asia Minor (so e.g., J. Reville, P. C. Porter, Jiilicher)? This is 
possible, for the name was common enough. But, if it is felt that 
the work must be connected with a more authoritative personality, 
tradition offers us the choice of three figures. (a) That of John 
Mark (so e.g., Hitzig, Weisse, and Hausrath), whom Dionysius of 
Alexandria mentions in this connection but only to set aside on the 
score of his un-Asiatic career, need not be seriously discussed, 
though Beza favoured his claims (“quod si liceret ex stylo con- 
jecturam facere, nemini certe potius quam Marco tribuerim qui et 
ipse Johannes dictus est’’). The real alternative lies between (6) 
John the son of Zebedee, and (c) John the presbyter, both of whom 
have strong traditional claims. The latter is not to be emended out 
of existence by any manipulation of the text of Papias, and we have 
no reason to regard the one as the doppelganger of the other. 
Whether Eusebius was right in arguing from that text or from 
other evidence that Papias was one of his hearers, John ὃ πρεσβύτερος 
was an important Christian disciple ; his authority was so great that 
he could be called ὁ πρεσβύτερος without any further designation. 
There is strong and early support for (b) in tradition, but the in- 
ternal evidence, as we have seen, is at best neutral and in certain 
lights unfavourable. It is impossible here to analyse that tradition in 
its bearings upon the Apocalypse, but it may be said that there were 
special reasons which contributed to its popularity (cf. § 9). Internal 
evidence weighed less with the early church than other considera- 
tions. The wavering position of the Apocalypse required nothing 
short of apostolic sanction to keep it within the canon, and indeed 
apostolic authorship came more and more to be tantamount to 
inspiration. Under these circumstances it was not easy for any theory 
or tradition of unapostolic authorship to keep its footing, Mr. 
Conybeare puts this succinctly (The Armenian Text of Revelation, 
pp. 161 f.): “Between 350 and 450 Greek texts of Revelation were 
rare in the Eastern half of the empire. The best minds of the 
Greek Church, men such as Eusebius Pamphili and Dionysius of 
Alexandria, denied its Johannine authorship. Living in an age when 


sometimes it is not fanciful to trace a special significance in some conventional 
phrase, ¢.g., the boom of the Mediterranean in i. 15, or in vi. 15-16—an allusion to 
the Sipylus range, north of the Gulf of Smyrna, where cisterns and holes cut in the 
rocks afforded temporary shelter to the population during the frequent panics caused 
by earthquakes on the coast (cf. Perrot and Chipiez, History of Art in Phrygia, 
Eng. tr., 1892, pp. 61-62). 

WOOL. V. 21 


326 INTRODUCTION 


old Greek was still the language of every-day life, they were too 
conscious of the contrasts of style which separate it from the 
Fourth gospel to accept the view that a single author wrote both. 
Having to accept John the apostle as author of one or the other, 
they decided in favour of the gospel. In the West, on the other 
hand, where both documents circulated only in a Latin dress, men 
were unconscious of these contrasts of style, and so found no diffi- 
culty in accepting both as writings of the apostle John.” Hence, 
taking the Apocalypse by itself on the one hand and the tradition οἱ 
John the presbyter on the other, we find both converging on the 
conclusion that, even if John the apostle did survive till the end of 
the first century in Asia Minor, it was not he but his namesake who 
wrote the Johannine Apocalypse. καὶ ot πρεσβύτεροι ὑμῶν ἐνυπνίοις 
ἐνυπνιασθήσονται (Acts ii. 17), under the influence of the prophetic 
spirit. In this case, the term πρεσβύτερος (as in 2 John ver. 3, and 
3 John ver. 1) is the Christian term of honour and authority (cf. 
Deissmann, 154 f., 233 f.), not the Jewish term! for a member of the 
Sanhedrin (πρεσβύτης). Occasionally, as in the case of John, the 
presbyter must have had prophetic gifts; the fragments preserved 
by Irenzeus from the tradition of the Asiatic presbyters point un- 
mistakably to prophetic and even chiliastic tendencies, though they 
are more sensuous than in the corresponding features in the Apo- 
calypse. John was also a μαθητὴς τοῦ κυρίου in the wider sense of the 
term. He was one of the most important authorities who were in 
touch with apostolic tradition, and it is easier to credit him with the 
rabbinic erudition and apocalyptic lore of the Apocalypse than one 
who was ἀγράμματος καὶ ἰδιώτης (Acts iv. 13). 

A further possibility (recognised by Erasmus) lies in the direction 
of pseudonymity. Apocalypses were almost invariably pseudony- 
mous, and it is held by some (e.g., S. Davidson, Weizsacker, Wernle, 
Forbes, and Bacon in Expositor, 1907, 233 f.), that the presumption 
is in favour of John’s Apocalypse also belonging to the pseudepi- 
grapha. This would be rendered more probable, were it taken to 
include fragments or traditions which were really due to John Mark 
(Spitta, Vélter), John the son of Zebedee (Erbes, Bruston), or John 
the presbyter (J. Weiss, so differently Bousset and Schmiedel). But 
it does not follow that an early Christian apocalypse must neces- 
sarily be pseudonymous. Hermas is not. Besides, one raison d étre 
for pseudonymity is absent, viz., the consciousness that the prophetic 

1So Selwyn (127 f.), holding that the author of the Apocalypse retained his 


earlier Jewish title. Butitis prosaic to see that semi-circular court reflected in 
iv. 2 f., or to find evidence of special legal knowledge in ν. 1 and xii. ro, 


INTRODUCTION 327 


spirit was no longer present in the church. The amount of ante- 
dated prediction in the Apocalypse (i.e., in xiii. xvii.), too, is barely 
adequate, of itself, to support this theory. And it may be argued 
that a pseudonymous writer would probably have been more ex- 
plicit upon the apostolic authority of John, 1.6., if John the apostle 
was the John under whose name he issued the Apocalypse. The 
case for the latter form of the hypothesis would be strengthened, 
of course, if it could be shown, as many critics have recently 
attempted to prove, that the tradition of John’s early martyrdom is 
reliable. In any case the ardent and even vindictive spirit of the 
Apocalypse is not to be connected necessarily with Luke ix. 55. 
Such a passionate, unpatriotic temper would be as much due to the 
apocalyptic traditions and to the local exigencies of the period as to 
any personal idiosyncracy, and if John retained this feeling till the 
end of the century, or even till the seventh or eighth decade, he 
must have profited very little by the lesson which Jesus had read 
him long ago. When he is connected with the tradition or author- 
ship of the Fourth gospel, the supposition that he was responsible 
for the attitude of the Apocalypse becomes doubly, trebly difficult. 

To sum up. The Apocalypse was a product of the ‘ Johannine” 
school or circle in Asia Minor, towards the close of the first century. 
Beyond the disjunctive canon that it was not composed by the 
author of the Fourth Gospel, but that it may have been written by 
the presbyter whose name appears in the address of 2 and 3 John, 
we can hardly go, in our comparison of the Johannine writings. 
The data of tradition are unfortunately ambiguous and contradic- 
tory, but, whether or not the son of Zebedee resided in Asia 
Minor, the presbyter John seems on the whole to suit the require- ὁ 
ments of the Apocalypse better than any other contemporary figure, 
and, unless we are content with Castellio and others to share the 
pious reticence of Dionysius (ὅτι μὲν οὖν ᾿Ιωάννης ἐστὶν ὁ ταῦτα γράφων, 
αὐτῷ λέγοντι πιστευτέον - ποῖος δὲ οὗτος, ἄδηλον), the balance of probability 
is in favour either of pseudonymity or of the hypothesis that the 
prophet John who composed the Apocalypse was the presbyter John 
of early Christian tradition (so after Dionysius, from various stand- 
points,! Eichhorn, Wittichen, De Wette, Mangold, Credner, Bleek, 
Ewald, Keim, Havet, Disterdieck, Selwyn, Erbes, O. Holtzmann, 
Harnack, Kohler, Von Soden, Heinrici (Das Urchristenthum, 1902, 
126 ἢ), ana Von Dobschitz (Probleme d. apost. Zeitalters, 1904, 
91 f.). 


1 Grotius: ‘‘ Credo autem presbytero, apostoli discipulo, custoditum hunc librum ; 
inde factum, ut eius esse opus a quibusdam per errorem crederetur”. Loisy (1 


328 INTRODUCTION 


§ 9. The Reception of the Apocalypse.—No immediate traces of 
the Apocalypse (cf. Zahn’s Geschichte des N. T. Kanons, i., pp. 201 f., 
and Leipoldt’s Gesch. d. N. T. Kanons, 1., pp. 32 f., 58 f., etc.), are to 
be found in early Christian literature; the two or three apparent 
allusions in Clemens Romanus, Barnabas, and Hermas, imply 
nothing but common oral tradition or the independent use of the 
O.T., if not of apocryphal sources. Ignatius, however, seems to have 
known it (see on iii. 12, xxi. 3); certainly Papias and Justin did. 
Melito of Sardis (c. 170 4.0.) wrote a commentary upon it, while Apol- 
lonius and Theophilus of Antioch were acquainted with it; so were 
the Valentinians, and of course the chiliasts. Irenzeus and the Ep. 
Lugd. attest its circulation in southern Gaul (c. 177 a.p.). Clement 
also read it in Alexandria as a sacred scripture. The evidence of the 
martyrdoms and of Tertullian proves that in Africa, as well as in 
southern Gaul and Egypt, it was widely circulated before the close of 
the second century, and the Muratorian canon witnesses to its author- 
ity in Rome. But it did not escape sharp criticism (τί pe ὠφελεῖ ἡ 
ἀποκάλυψις Ἰωάννου, λέγουσά μοι περὶ ἑπτὰ ἀγγέλων καὶ ἑπτὰ σαλπίγγων ;) 
and even repudiation not only from Marcion, with his antipathy to the 
O.T., but from the anti-Montanists, alike in Asia Minor and in Rome,! 
who disliked the sensuous elements in its prophecies and repudiated 
ecstasy as a form of true prophecy. The predilection for Hellenistic 
eschatology also helped to throw it into disfavour, as compared 
with, e.g., The Apocalypse of Peter, which even the Muratorian 
canon ranks alongside of it. Another feature which probably told 
against its popularity was its unpatriotic attitude to the empire. 
When prayers were offered in the churches for the emperor, and 
when the empire had come to be viewed, as Paul had taught, in the 


Quatr. Evangile, p. 134), Swete, M‘Giffert, Peake (Introd. N.T., 1909, 152 f.), and 
some others incline to this hypothesis with hesitation, as does Jacoby (Neutestam. 
Ethik, 1899, 444-455). It was admitted by Vogel (Commentattones, etc., 1811-1816), 
who was almost the first to suggest the composite origin of the Apocalypse. 

1 The controversy between Hippolytus and Gaius the Roman presbyter, in the 
beginning of the third century, shows {πὲ the latter, like the Alogi, possibly ascribed 
the Apocalypse to Cerinthus (cf. Schwartz’s essay, Ueber den Tod d. Sdhne Zebedaei, 
1904, pp. 33-45). Hippolytus feels that Caius has gone too far in his wholesale 
Tepudiation of the Apocalypse along with its Montanist exploiters. One of the 
objections urged by the Alogi was that there was no church at Thyatira, and con- 
sequently that John was no true prophet, which probably means that the local 
church had become Montanist (cf. Corssen in Texte τι. Unters., xv. 1, 52-56), and 
therefore had ceased to exist as a church, from the standpoint of catholic Chris- 
tianity. For the most part, as Dionysius says, they went through every chapter of 
the book, with a keen scent for its Oriental phantasy (ἄγνωστόν τε kal ἀσυλλόγιστον 
ἀποφαίνοντες). 


INTRODUCTION 329 


light of a providential bulwark, it is not surprising that John’s 
Apocalypse had a hard struggle to retain its place in the canon, and 
that except in times of sore persecution it did not appeal to the 
majority of Christians. The result was that before very long the 
only means of preserving it for ecclesiastical edification was to alle- 
gorise it freely. This naturally threw the interpretation of the book 
quite out of focus, so that the fortunes of the Apocalypse really 
form a chapter in the history of the canon or of the church (cf. 
Liicke, §§ 30-36, 50-59), But even prior to, or independent of, the 
allegorical interpretation, the book had vitality. It is paradoxical to 
claim that the apocalypses of the early church, including that of 
John, were the first Christian scriptures to be canonised, owing to 
their prophetic origin, which ranked them with the O.T. Their 
place in the series of prophetic writings is obvious, but the treatise 
de aleatoribus, from which the main evidence for this theory is 
drawn, is of too uncertain a date to be used safely in this connexion. 
Still, the Apocalypse did retain its vogue in many circles of the 
early church, especially throughout the west. Often this was due 
to a vague and correct instinct for John’s great religious message 
in spite of its archaic paraphernalia and its fantastic elements (cf. 
Renan, 479, 480). Yet even its literal prophecies still maintained 
an appeal of their own. It was the chiliasm of the book, not its 
unfulfilled predictions, which proved a difficulty. The prediction 
which went soonest out of date (i.e., xvii. 8-11) seems to have 
occasioned as little trouble to the church as the Sibyiline oracles 
or the similar passages of the O.T. prophets. The Apocalypse 
evidently was not final any more than normal.’ Besides, against 
the failure of its historical programme to correspond with the 
subsequent trend of history, must be set the fact that the num- 
ber of the Beast could be interpreted as Trajan, Hadrian, or Marcus 
Aurelius, that the expectation? of a Nero-antichrist lingered down to 
the fifth century in certain corners of the popular religious mind, 
that Gog and Magog were repeatedly expected in the form of savage 
hordes (Huns, Goths, etc.), and that the dread (cf. Lightfoot’s 
Ignatius, i., 644 f.) of a Parthian invasion did not become obsolete 
till the third century. In several respects the book could still be 
taken reasonably as a prediction of near events. Thus, by the time 
that Constantine’s policy had antiquated the Apocalypse’s view of 


1Cf. A. B. Davidson on this point in Hastings, D.B., i. 736, 737: iv. 126. 

2 Though “it was during the continuance of the Flavian dynasty that the ex- 
pectation was at white heat,” yet it ‘lingered on for many centuries” (Lightfoot, 
Clem. Rom., ii., pp. 511, 512). 


330 INTRODUCTION 


the Roman State, the position of the book was fairly secure. New 
systems of interpretation, allegorical (¢.g., that of Tyconius) and 
semi-historical, were devised to vindicate its rights as a scripture of 
the church, and these were the more cordially welcomed, as the 
book itself was enigmatic and in parts ambiguous. All sense of its 
original object had faded from the uncritical mind of the church. 
Dogmatic prepossessions underlay its rejection as well as its recep- 
tion; it was exposed to extravagant censure and extravagant praise, 
but the growing belief in its apostolic origin helped to save it, like 
Hebrews, from ultimate exclusion or depreciation. In the case of 
the one book as of the other, the instinct which determined the 
judgment of the councils and the churches was sounder than the 
political reasons which they adduced. Nostra res agitur, they felt. 
The authentic note of loyalty to Jesus Christ at all costs was audible 
enough to prevail with them over their antipathy to the crashing 
discords of Christian apocalyptic.1 

§ 10. Literature, etc.—In addition to abbreviations which are 
already noted (page 284), or which are obvious enough, the following 
may be mentioned :— 


Abbott = E. A. Abbott’s Notes on N. T. Criticism (1907), pp. 75 f., 
175 f. 

AC = Bousset’s der Antichrist (Eng. Tr. by Keane, 1896). 

Baldensperger=sec. ed. (1892) of Baldensperger’s das Selbst- 
bewusstsein Fesu. ; 

Blass=Grammatik des NTlichen Griechisch (2nd ed. 1902; 
Eng. Tr. 1905). 

Boéklen=B.’s die Verwandtschaft d. jiidisch-christlichen mit der 
Parsischen Eschatologie (1902). 

Burton=E. de W. Burton’s New Testament Moods and Tenses 
(2nd ed. 1894). 

C.B.P.=W. M. Ramsay’s Cities and Bishoprics of Phrygia, vol. i. 
part i. (1895), part ii. (1897). 

Dalman = Dalman’s Worte Fesu (Eng. Tr. The Words of Fesus). 

Dieterich =A. Dieterich’s Nekyia (1893). 


1“ Tf a great man interprets a national crisis so as to bring home to the nation 
its true ideals and destination, he remains a true prophet even if his forecast was 
mistaken. Without the critical situation it is probable that the great man could 
never have brought so much truth to such powerful expression. So an eschatology 
is not to be judged by a simple rule of agreement with facts, but rather by its fitness 
under the circumstances to quicken faith in God, to stir the conscience and put 
men’s wills under the domination of ideal motives, to give a living sense of God 
and eternity ’ (F. C. Porter, Messages of the Apoc. Writers, p. 73). 


INTRODUCTION 33) 


Dobschiitz = Von Dobschiitz’s die wurchristlichen Gemeinden 
(1902; Eng. Tr., ‘‘ Christian Life in the Primitive Church,” 
1904). 

E.B.D.—The Egyptian Book of the Dead” (ed. E. Wallis Budge; 
the translation, 1898). 

E.Bi.=The Encyclopedia Biblica. 

E.F.=The F$ewish Encyclopedia (1901 ff.). 

Ep. Lugd.=“ The epistle of the churches at Vienne and Lyons,” 
177 a.v. (Eus. H.E. v. 1). 

Priedlander = Darstellungen aus der Sittengeschichte Roms (1888, 
6th ed.), by L. Friedlander. 

Gfroérer = Gfrorer’s das Fahrhundert des Heils (1838). 

Grill =Jd. Grill’s Untersuch. tiber die Entstehung d. vierten Evglms 
(1902). 

Grotius = Grotius’s Annotationes, viii. 234 f. (1839 ed.). 

Helbing = R. Helbing’s Grammatik der Septuaginta (1907). 

Gregory =C. R. Gregory’s Textkritik des N.T. (1900-1909). 

Jastrow = Prof. Morris Jastrow’s The Religion of Babylonia and 
Assyria (1898). 

Jeremias=A. Jeremias’ Babylonisches im N. T. (1905). 

Kattenbusch = K., das apostolische Symbol, vol. ii. (1900). 

Lueken = Lueken’s Michael (1898). 

Moulton=J. H. Moulton’s Gramm. N. T. Greek, vol. i. (sec. ed., 
1906). 

Pausanias=Pausanias’ ‘Description of Greece” (ed. J. G. 
Frazer, 1898). 

Pfleiderer =das Urchristentum (1902), vol. ii., pp. 281 ἢ. 

P.W.=Pauly’s Real-Encycl. der class. Altertumswissenschaft 
(ed. Wissowa, 1894 f.). 

Renan = Renan’s L’antéchrist (1871). 

R.$.=Bousset’s die Religion des Fudentums im neutest. Zeitalter 
(1903; the references are to the first edition). 

R.S.=W. Robertson Smith’s Religion of the Semites. 

S.B.E.=‘ The Sacred Books of the East’”’ (Oxford). 

S.C.=Gunkel’s Schipfung und Chaos (1895): with his essay 
(1903) Zum religionsgesch. Verstindnis des Ν. T. (cf. The 
Monist, 1903, 398-455). 

Selwyn =E. C. Selwyn: ‘‘ The Christian Prophets and the Pro- 
phetic Apocalypse ”’ (1901). 

Stave = Ueber d. Einfluss d. Parsismus auf d. fudentum (1898). 

Thumb= Die Griechische Sprache im Zettalter d. Hellenismus 
(1901). 


332 INTRODUCTION 


Titius= Dr. A. Titius: die vulgare Anschauung von d. Seligkett 
im Urchristentum (1900). 

Viteau =Viteau’s Etude sur le grecque du nouveau Testament, vol. 
i. (1893), vol. ii. (1896). 

Volz=P. Volz: $iidische Eschatologie (1903). 

Weinel=Weinel’s die Wirkungen des Geistes u. der Geister im 
nachap. Zeitalter (1899). 

Weizsacker = The Apostolic Age (Eng. Tr., 1894-1895). 

Win. = Winer’s Grammatik (8th ed., by P. W. Schmiedel). 

In order to save space, most of the citations from the O.T. and 
the N.T. have been relegated to the margin; often the substance 
of a note has been crushed into a handful of such references. It has 
been impossible to give any register of opinion or history of inter- 
pretation, and I have abstained from furnishing such grammatical, 
philological, or geographical information as may be found in any 
concordance, grammar, or dictionary of the Bible. For fuller details 
on questions of introduction I must refer the reader to the relevant 
sections in my forthcoming Introduction to the Literature of the 
New Testament. 

The English student is now excellently served by the articles of 
Bousset (E.Bi. i. 194-212, summarising the result$ of his editio prin- 
ceps in Meyer [1896, 1906]) and Dr. F. C. Porter (Hastings’ Dict. of 
the Bible, iv. pp. 239-266, an invaluable introduction), and by Dr. 
Swete’s full edition of the Greek text (3rd. ed. 1909). Manual edi- 
tions by W. H. Simcox (Cambridge Greek Testament, 1893), C. A. 
Scott (Century Bible, 1902), and H. P. Forbes (Intern. Handbks 
to N. T., iv., 1907, pp. 86-149). The main English contributions, 
since Alford, are those of Farrar (Early Days of Christianity, 1882, 
ch. xxviii.), Lee (Speaker's Comm. 1881), Wordsworth (1875), Randall 
(Pulpit Comm., 1890), Milligan (Discussions on the Apocalypse, 1893; 
also his edition in the fourth vol. of Schaff’s Commentary), E. W. 
Benson (The Apoc., 1900), Selwyn, and Briggs (Messiah of the 
Apostles, pp. 285-461); cf. further G. H. Gilbert (The First Inter- 
preters of Fesus, 1901, pp. 332-397), F. Palmer’s The Drama of the 
Apocalypse (1903), H. Berg’s The Drama of the Apocalypse (1894), 
Dr. F. Ὁ. Porter’s Messages of the Apoc. Writers (1905, pp. 169- 
296), the English translations of Beyschlag’s Neutest. Theol. (vol. ii., 
247-361) and Wernle’s Die Anfange, pp. 256-274 (“The Beginnings 
of Christianity,” 1901, vol. i., pp. 360 f.), Sir W. M. Ramsay's Letters 
to the Seven Churches (1904), Hort’s posthumous fragment (A foc. 
i.-iii., 1908), and Canon J. J. Scott’s The Apocalypse (1909). 

German edd.—De Wette (1848), Bleek (Eng. tr. 1875), Diister- 


INTRODUCTION 333 


dieck (1887), B. Weiss (2nd ed. 1902), J. Weiss (die Schriften des 
N. T., 1907), Bousset, and H. J. Holtzmann (Hand-Commentar, 3rd. 
ed., 1908). Schmiedel’s Volksbuch (1906) is included in the English 
edition of his fohannine Writings (1908). There is a competent 
Dutch commentary by J. M. S. Baljon (Utrecht, 1908); besides 
French works by Havet (Le Christ. et ses origines, iv. 314-344), Reuss 
(Paris, 1878), A. Crampon (Tournai, 1904), and Th. Calmes (Paris, 
1905), with the last-named scholar’s pamphlet, L’Apoc. devant la 
.tradition et devant la critique® (1907). Baljon’s critical introduction 
is given in his Geschiedenis van de Boeken des nieuwen Verbonds 
(1901), 241-265. 

Of the commentaries which preceded Alford, almost the only 
English works which retain any critical value are those of Moses 
Stuart (Andover, 1845: on the lines of Liicke) and Trench (Com- 
mentary on the Epp. to the Seven Churches, 1861, sixth edition, 
1897). 

Since the present commentary was drafted, six years ago, a 
‘number of monographs, including some of those just mentioned, have 
been issued. I have occasionally inserted references to them in the 
‘text, for the sake of convenience and completeness, but, for the 
-sake of independence, the notes have otherwise been left untouched. 








νὴ ' 
Wn i y 
Np vaya py 
ye if M wit sii i ον 
r : | sf : aly, “Ἀὴ Winans 
‘ τ : Ὁ} bn) mpi ry 
᾿ ' Uy ᾿ εν a 
ks { ψυυ aL) be {ΜΠ Ὴ | pai Ὧ 
ΤΥ * Te ue i AM oe 
| | ᾿ μὴ Ἷ ΤῊΝ Sone oa 
ας | il ih anne 


















ΤΡ open Α 
Maes. 


"δ εν". 





ATIOKAAYY¥IZ IQANNOY.’* 


1, I. “"ANOKAAYWIE Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, ἣν " ἔδωκεν αὐτῷ ὁ θεὸς a Sc. joe 
~ A Ἐπ a A a ἐσ 
εδεῖξαι τοῖς δούλοις αὐτοῦ,2 ἃ δεῖ γενέσθαι ἐν τάχει, καὶ ἐσήμανεν (article 
absent 
as from 


Matt. i. 1, cf. Win. § 19, 10). For eschat. connotation, cf. Rom. ii. 5, viii. 19. b John xii. 49, 


xiv. 10: constr. John vi. 52. c John v. 20, x. 32. 


10m. with WC, etc. (edd.), from the title the του θεολογσυν of Q and (with ex- 
pansions) many cursives, which was a description of the apostle John in the fourth 
century as the author of the fourth gospel, and applied to him here as the exponent 
of divine oracles (θεολογος = προφητης, Philo, de Vit. Mos., ii. 11; Luc., Alex., το, 
22) or as the herald of God (cf. Chrys., Orat., 36). Inscriptions show that θεολογοι 
were sacred officials in Pergamum, Ephesus, Smyrna, etc. (Deissm., 231-232, Licht 
vom Osten, 252 f.), who were frequently vpvwdor as well. 


2 Punctuate Geos δειξαι τ. ὃ. avtov, with WH, Ws., Bs., Hort. On the alterna- 
tive form Iwaver (δ ἢ), c/. Win. § 5, 26c, Schmiedel (E. Bi., 2504-2505), Thumb 2of., 


Helbing 29-30. 


CuapPTER I.—Vv. 1-3. The superscrip- 
tion. Ἀπ. Ἰωάννου is the ecclesiastical 
title (distinguishing it from the apocalypse 
of Peter, or of Paul, etc.) of what professes 
in reality to be an am. ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ 
(subjective genitive), z.e., a disclosure of 
the divine μυστήρια (Dan. ii. 19, 22, 28, 
Theod.) in the immediate future (ἃ Set 
y- ἐν τάχει) which has been communi- 
cated (ἔδωκεν, cf. on iii. 9) by God to 
Jesus (cf. v. 7) and which in turn is trans- 
mitted by Jesus (Gal. i. 12) to John asa 
member of the prophetic order. 

Ver. 1. δούλοις, in specific sense of 
x. 7, xi. 18, after Dan. ix. 6, 10; Zech. 
i. 6, and Amos iii. 7 (ἀποκαλύψῃ 
παιδείαν πρὸς τοὺς δούλους αὐτοῦ τοὺς 
προφήτας). Fesus Christ is used only 
in i, 1-5 (xxii. 21 ὃ), Lord Fesus only in 
xxii. 20, Lord (i.e., Jesus) only in xi. 8 and 
xiv. 13; elsewhere either ὁ Χριστός (xx. 
4, 6) αὐτοῦ (xi. 15, xii. Io) or (as in 
Hebrews) the simple Fesus. ἃ δεῖ κιτ.λ. 
(from Dan. ii. 28-29), either object of 
δεῖξαι (Vit. ii. 229) or more probably 
in opposition to ἥν. ἐν Taxer.=‘‘ soon” 
(as in Clem. Rom. xxiii. 5 and the in- 
structive logion of Luke xviii. 8). This 
is the hinge and staple of the book. 
When the advent of Jesus is hailed as 
a relief, it is no consolation to say that 
the relief will come suddenly; sudden 


Or not, it must come soon (x. 7), if it is 
to be of any service. The keynote of the 
Apocalypse is the cheering assurance 
that upon God’s part there is no re. 
luctance or delay; His people have not 
long to wait now. καὶ ἐσήμανεν (so of 
what is future and momentous, Ezek. 
xxxili. 3, Acts xi. 26, etc.: Heracleitus 
on the Delphic oracle, οὔτε λέγει οὔτε 
κρύπτει ἀλλὰ σημαίνει) ἀποστείλας 
(from seventh heaven, in Asc. Isa. vi. 
13), a loose Heb. idiom for “he (i.e., 
Jesus here and in xxii. 16, God in xxii. 
6) sent and signified it”. διὰ (as in 
Asc. Isa. xi. 30, etc.) τοῦ ἀγγέλου αὐτοῦ 
(cf. Test. Jos. vi. 6). Jesus is the medium 
of all revelation, but ἀποκάλυψις is fur- 
ther conceived of as transmitted through 
the angelus interpres, a familiar and im- 
portant figure in rabbinic (cf. E. F. i 
592, 593) and apocalyptic tradition (see 
reff. and on Acts vii. 30), who stands 
here between Jesus and the prophet as 
a sort of double of the former. Like 
Hermas (Mand. xi. 9), the post-exilic 
tradition required the executive function 
of this angel, in order to (a) satisfy the 
yearning for some means of divine com- 
munication, and (δ) at the same time to 
maintain reverence for the divine glory 
(Baldensperger, 48 f.). But John’s Chris- 
tian consciousness here and elsewhere ir 


330 


ATIOKAAYVIZ IQANNOY Ἢ 


. “Ἀ wn - A δ 
dZech.i. ἀποστείλας διὰ τοῦ 4 ἀγγέλου αὐτοῦ τῷ δούλῳ αὐτοῦ ᾿Ιωάννῃ, 2. ὃς 


Ὁ. 13.11.8». ͵ Η͂ 
Dan. Vi11.EMOPTUPTNOEV τον 
16,ix.2rf.,., 
Ap. Bar. οσαὰα 
lv. 3 

(Ramiel), 

etc.: Dieterich’s Mithras Liturgie, 47 f. 


: εἶδεν. 


e Ver. 9. 


A A , aA ΄“΄ 
“λόγον τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ τὴν μαρτυρίαν ᾿Ιησοῦ Χριστοῦ, 
3. μακάριος 6 δ ἀναγινώσκων καὶ οἱ ἀκούοντες τοὺς 


f i.e., in present apocalypse. g 2 Cor. 


iii. 15, Acts xv. 21, Matt. xxiv. 15, 1 Tim. iv. 13, Clem. Hom. xix. 


too large for the traditional and artificial 
forms of its expression. Unless this angel 
is identified with that of x. 1 f., he plays 
only a scanty and tardy réle (xvii. 1 ἢ, 
xxi. 5 f.) in the series of visions; the 
prophet’s sense of direct experience (¢.g., 
in i. g f.) bursts through the cumbrous 
category of an intermediate agent be- 
tween himself and Christ. It is by a 
conventional form of religious sym- 
bolism prevalent in this genre of litera- 
ture, that Jesus, like Yahweh in Ezekiel 
(cf. x. I, 3, xliv. 2), is represented both as 
addressing the prophet directly and as 
instructing him indirectly. The latter 
mode of expression (cf. Milton’s Uriel 
and 4 Esd. iv. 1) was due to a hypos- 
tatising tendency which was not confined 
to Judaism. As Plutarch points out (¢f. 
below on viii. 5 and xv. 8), the daemons 
in Hellenic religion are a middle term 
between the divine and the human; they 
prevent the former from being disturbed 
or contaminated by direct intercourse 
with men, and they also act as inter- 
preters who communicate the divine will 
to men (cf. De Iside 25; Oakesmith’s Re- 
ligion of Plutarch, pp. 121 f., 163 ἢ). 
Wherever the reaction against material- 
ism prevailed, especially in the popular 
religion of the empire, the belief in 
daemons or spirits as intermediate 
agents gave expression to the convic- 
tion that human weakness could not 
come into direct touch with the divine 
glory (cf. Friedlander, iii. 430 f. ; Hatch’s 
Hibbert Lectures, 245 f.). 

Ver. 2. épapr. (epistol. aor., cf. Phim. 
το, cf. further Thuc. i. 1 ξυνέγραψε). Ady. 


τ. 6, like PTT VAT (LXX λόγος τοῦ 


θεοῦ, e.g., Jer. i. 2), a collective term for 
God’s disclosures to men (τοὺς λόγους, 
3), or as here for some specific revelation 
more exactly defined in ὅσα εἶδεν, all 
that was seen or even heard (Amos i. 
I) in visions being described by this 
generic term. The double expression 
the word of God and the testimony 
borne by Fesus Christ (xxii. 16, 20; 
cf. xix. 10) is an amplified phrase for 
the gospel. The subject upon which 
Jesus assures men of truth is the re- 
velation of God’s mind and heart, and 


the gospel is that utterance of God—that 
expression of His purpose—which Jesus 
unfolds and attests. The book itself is 
the record of John’s evidence; he testi- 
fies to Christ, and Christ testifies of the 
future as a divine plan. For the re- 
velation of God, in the specific form of 
prophecy, requires a further medium 
between Jesus and the ordinary Chris- 
tian; hence the rdle of the prophets. 
On the prophetic commission to write, 
cf. Asc. Isa. i. 4-5 and i. 2, παρέδωκεν 
αὐτῷ τοὺς λόγους τῆς προφητείας ots 
αὐτὸς εἶδεν, κιτιλ. The primitive sense 
οὗ μαρτ. (=oral confession and procla- 
mation of Jesus by his adherents) ‘thus 
expands into a literary sense (as here) 
and into the more sombre meaning of 
martyrdom (ii. 13, John xviii. 37-39, xix. 
19; cf. Lightfoot on Clem. Rom. v.). It 
is significant that the λόγος τ. θ. of 
Judaism was not adequate to the Chris- 
tian consciousness without the μαρτυρία 
Ἰησοῦ. 

Ver. 3. The first of the seven beati- 
tudes in the Apocalypse (xiv. 13, xvi. 15, 
xix. 9, xx. 6, xxii. 7, 14), endorsing the 
book as a whole. In the worship of the 
Christian communities one member read 
aloud, originally from the O.T. as in the 
synagogues, and afterwards from Chris- 
tian literature as well (apostolic epistles, 
Col. iv. 16, and sub-apostolic epistles), 
while the rest of the audience listened 
(Eus. H. E. iv. 23). In its present form 
the Apocalypse was composed with this 
object in view. Cf. Justin’s description 
of the Christian assemblies on Sunday, 
when, as the first business, τὰ ἀπομνη- 
μονεύματα τῶν ἀποστόλων ἢ τὰ συγ- 
γράμματα τῶν προφητῶν ἀναγινώσκεται 
(Apol. i. 67). The art of reading was 
not a general accomplishment in the 
circles from which the Christian societies 
were for the most part recruited, and 
this office of reader (ἀναγνώστης), as 
distinct from that of the president, soon 
became one of the regular minor posi- 
tions in the worship of the church. 
Here the reader’s function resembles 
that of Baruch (cf. Jer. xxii. 5, 6). 
τηροῦντες τὰ, K.T.A., carefully heeding 
the warnings of the book, observing its 
injunctions, and expecting the fulfilment 


2—4. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 


997 


λόγους " τῆς προφητείας καὶ ' τηροῦντες τὰ ἐν αὐτῇ γεγραμμένα "Β Cf. xxii. 


*6 γὰρ καιρὸς ἐγγύς. 


4. ‘lwdvyns ταῖς ἑπτὰ ἐκκλησίαις ταῖς ἐν τῇ ᾿Ασίᾳ - ᾿ χάρις ὑμῖν 


18-19. 
salutation). 


of its predictions, instead of losing heart 
and faith (Luke xviii. 8). Cf. Hipp. De 
Antich. 2 and En. civ. 12, ‘‘ books will 
be given to the righteous and the wise 
to become a cause of joy and uprightness 
and much wisdom”. The content of the 
Apocalypse is not merely prediction ; 
moral counsel and religious instruction 
are the primary burden of its pages. 
The bliss of the obedient and attentive, 
however, is bound up with the certainty 
that the crisis at which the predictions 
of the book are to be realised is im- 
minent ; they have not to wait long for 
the fulfilment of their hopes. This, with 
the assurance of God’s interest and inter- 
vention, represented the ethical content 
of early Christian prediction, which would 
have been otherwise a mere satisfaction 
of curiosity ; see on ver. 19. 

[Note on i. 1-3. If this inscription 
(absent from no MS.) is due to the 
author, it must have been added (so 
Bruston, Julicher, Hirscht, Holtzm., Bs.), 
like the προοίμιον of Thucydides, after 
he had finished the book as a whole. 
But possibly it was inserted by the later 
hand of an editor or redactor (V6lter, 
Erbes, Briggs, Hilg., Forbes, Well- 
hausen, J. Weiss, Simcox=elders of 
Ephesus, John xxi. 24) rather than of a 
copyist (Spitta, Sabatier, Schén), who 
reproduced the Johannine style of the 
Apocalypse proper. At the same time, 
the change from the third to the first 
person (ver. g) is not unexampled (cf. 
Jer. i. 1-3, 4 f.; Ezek. i. 1-4; Enoch re- 
peatedly), and forms no sure proof of 
an original text overlaid with editorial 
touches; nor is a certain sententious 
objectivity (cf. Herod. i. 1, ii. 23, etc.) 
unnatural at the commencement of a 
book, when the writer has occasion to 
introduce himself. The real introduc- 
tion begins at ver. 4 (cf. xxii. 21).] 

Vv. 4-8. The prologue. 

Ver. 4. ταῖς ἑπτὰ éxxX., seven being 
the sacred and complete number in 
apocalyptic symbolism (E. Bi. 3436). 
The tats must refer proleptically to 
to ver. 11; for other churches existed 
and flourished in proconsular Asia at 
this time, e.g., at Troas, Magnesia, 
Hierapolis and Colossae, with which 


k After Dan. vii. 22 (Lk. xxi. 8-9), cf. Ap. Bar. xxiii. 7. 


i Lk. xi. 28, 
a John xiii. 
17; con- 
trast be- 
low, xxii. 
1 Sc. ety (primit. Christ. 


the prophet must have been familiar. 
These seven are selected by him for 
some special reason which it is no 
longer possible to disinter (see above, 
Introd., § 2). ἀπὸ ὁ dv, κιτιλ., a 
quaint and deliberate violation of gram- 
mar (Win. § 10, το Moult. i. g) in 
order to preserve the immutability and 
absoluteness of the divine name from 
declension, though it falls under the 
rule that in N.T. and LXX parenthetic 
and accessory clauses tend to assume an 
independent construction. The divine 
title is a paraphrase probably suggested 
by rabbinic language (¢.g., Targum 
Jonath. apud Deut. xxxii. 39, ego ille, 
qui est et qui fuit et qui erit); the 
idea would be quite familiar to Hellenic 
readers from similar expressions, ¢.g., in 
the song of doves at Dodona (Ζεὺς ἦν, 
Ζεὺς ἔστιν, Ζεὺς ἔσσεται) or in the titles 
of Asclepius and Athene. Simon Magus 
is said to have designated himself also 
as 6 ἐστὼς, ὁ στὰς, ὁ στησόμενος, and 
the shrine of Minerva (=Isis) at Sais 
bore the inscription, I am all that hath 
been and is and shall be: my veil no 
mortal yet hath raised (Plut. de Iside, 
g), the latter part eclipsed by the com- 
forting Christian assurance here. ἦν, 
another deliberate anomaly (finite verb 
for participle) due so dogmatic reasons ; 
no past participle of εἰμί existed, and 
γενόμενος was obviously misleading. 
ὃ épx., instead of ὃ ἐσόμενος, to cor- 
respond with the keynote of the book, 
struck loudly in ver. 7. In and with his 
messiah, Jesus, God himself comes ; épx. 
(the present) acquires, partly through the 
meaning of the verb, a future signifi- 
cance. For the emphasis and priority 
of ὧν in this description of God, see the 
famous passage in Aug. Confess. ix. το. 
τ. ἑπτὰ πνευμάτων: a puzzling concep- 
tion whose roots have been traced in 
various directions to (a) an erroneous 
but not unnatural interpretation of Isa. 
xi. 2-3, found in the Targ. Jonath. (as in 
En. lxi. 11, sevenfold spirit of virtues) 
and shared by Justin (Dial. 87, cf. 
Cohort. ad Graec., c. 32, ὥσπερ ot ἱεροὶ 
προφῆται τὸ ἕν καὶ τὸ αὐτὸ πνεῦμα εἰς 
ἑπτὰ πνεύματα μερίζεσϑαί φασιν), or— 
more probably—to the later Jewish 


538 AILOKAAY¥IZ LQANNOY 1. 


m i. 8, iv. 8, καὶ εἰρήνη ἀπὸ ™6 dv καὶ ὁ ἦν καὶ ὁ ™épxdpevos: καὶ ἀπὸ τῶν 
X. Ill. 


14f. ἑπτὰ πνευμάτων ἃ ἐνώπιον τοῦ θρόνου αὐτοῦ - 5. καὶ ἀπὸ Ἰησοῦ 

n From | ABE e¢ p ό © q a ~ Ape 
Hab. ii.3,Xptotod, °6 μάρτυς ὁ "πιστός, 6 “ πρωτότοκος τῶν νεκρῶν, καὶ ὃ 
Zech. ti. rm - λέ κ᾿ - A A ε A 4 , fe Ree 

_"dpxov τῶν βασιλέων τῆς γῆς " TO ἀγαπῶντι ἡμᾶς Kat λύσαντι * ἡμᾶς 
τ3, Heb. ἡ" 

xii. 1-2. John xvili. 37. 


ii. 10, 13, cf. Ps. Ixxxviii. 38 (LXX). 
Clem. Rom. xxiv. 


Ρ q 1 Cor. xv. 20, Col. i. 18, 
r Isa. lv. 4 (LXX), only here in Apoc. 


The λουσαντι . . - απο of PQ, min., vg., Me., Aeth., Areth. (so Bg., Trench, 
Few., de W., Balj., Sp., Bs., Burgon: Corruption in Trad. Text, 59-60; for constr. cf. 
Deissm., 227) is a corruption of λυσαντι εκ (SAC, τ, etc., Syr., Arm., Anda, Pr., edd., 
cf. xx. 7), probably due to misconception of Heb. use of ev (WH), and to the associa- 
tion of the two ideas (cf. Iren. iv. 27, 1: qui abluit et emundat eum hominem qui 
peccato fuerat obstrictus, and Plato’s Cratylus, 405 B 6 ἀπολούων τε καὶ ἀπολύων 


TOV κακών). 


notion (b) of the seven holy angels 
(Tobit xii. 15; cf. Gfrérer, i. 360 f) 
which reappears in early Christianity 
(cf. Clem. Al. Strom. vi. 685, ἑπτὰ μέν 
εἰσιν of τοῦ μεγίστου δύναμιν ἔχοντες 
πρωτόγονοι ἀγγέλων ἄρχοντες), modi- 
fied from (c) a still earlier Babylonian 
conception, behind (δ), of the seven 
spirits of the sky—the sun, the moon, 
and the five planets. The latter is not 
unknown to Jewish literature before 100 
A.D. (cf. Jub. ii. 2 £; Berachoth, 32, δ), 
corresponding to the Persian Amshas- 
pands (Yasht, xix. 19, 20, S. B. E. xxxi. 
145) and reflected in “the seven first 
white ones” or angelic retinue of the 
Lord in Enoch xc. 21 f. (Cheyne, Orig. 
Ps. 281-2, 327 f., 334 f.; Stave, 216 f.; 
Liiken, 32 f.; R. ¥. 319). Whether the 
prophet and his readers were conscious 
of this derivation or not, the concep- 
tion is stereotyped and designed to ex- 
press in archaic terms the supreme 
majesty of God before whose throne 
(i.e., obedient and ready for any com- 
mission, cf. v. 6) these mighty beings 
live. They are not named or divided in 
the Apocalypse, but the objection to 
taking the expression in the sense of (a) 
denoting, as in Philo (where, ¢.g., 6 κατὰ 
EBSop.aSa ἅγιος or κινούμενος is a charac- 
teristic symbol of the divine Logos), the 
sevenfold and complete energy of the 
Spirit in semi-poetic fashion, is the 
obvious fact that this is out of line with 
the trinity of the apocalypse, which is 
allied to that of Luke ix. 26; 1 Tim. v. 
213; Just. Mart. Apol. i.6. The Spirit in 
the Apocalypse, as in Jude, 2 Peter and 
the pastoral epistles, is wholly prophetic. 
It has not the content of the »pirit in 
Paul orin the Fourth Gospel. Since the 
writer intends to enlarge upon the person 
=f Jesus, or because the seven spirits 


stood next to the deity in the traditional 


mise-en-scéne, he makes them precede 


Christ in order. 

Ver. 5. ἀπὸ, «.7.A., another gramma- 
tical anomaly; as usual the writer puts 
the second of two nouns in apposition, 
in the nominative.—é6 p. 6 wm. Jesus not 
merely the reliable witness to God but 
the loyal martyr: an aspect of his career 
which naturally came to the front in 
“the killing times”. ὃ πρωτότοκος (a 
Jewish messianic title by itself, Balden- 
sperger, 88) +. v., his resurrection is the 
pledge that death cannot separate the 
faithful from his company. The thought 
of this and of the following trait (cf. 
Matt. iv. 8 f.) is taken from Ps. Ixxxvili. 
28, κἀγὼ πρωτότοκον θήσομαι αὐτόν, 
ὑψηλὸν παρὰ τοῖς βασιλεῦσιν τῆς γῆς. 
On the two allied functions of ruling 
and witnessing (Isa. lv. 4) cf. the dif- 
ferent view of John xviii. 37. At the in- 
spiring thought of Christ’s lordship the 
prophet breaks into adoration—ayarevrt 
κιτιλ. The eternal love (cf. iii. 19) which 
Christ bears to his people is proved by 
his death, as a revelation of (4) what he 
has done for them by his sacrifice, and 
(b) what he has made of them (so Eph. 
v. 25-26=Apoc. xix. 7, 8). The negative 
deliverance from sins (cf. Ps. cxxix. 8) at 
the cost of his own life (ἐν instrumental) 
is a religious emancipation which issues in 
(6) a positive relationship of glorious religi- 
ous privilege.—Baotdelay, ἱερεῖς, a literal 
(cf. Charles on Jub. xvi. 18) and inac- 


curate rendering of Orr natn 


(Exod. xix. 6) to emphasise the royal 
standing of the Christian community in 
connexion with their Christ as ἄρχων; 
κιτιλ., and also (Tit. ii. 3) their indivi- 
dual privilege of intimate access to God 
as the result of Christ’s sacrificial death. 


= ay 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


399 


ἐκ τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν ἡμῶν " ἐν τῷ αἵματι αὐτοῦ - 6. καὶ ἐποίησεν ἡμᾶς 5 v.9, 1 Pet. 


i, 18-10. 


" βασιλείαν 1 ἱερεῖς τῷ θεῷ καὶ “ πατρὶ αὐτοῦ - " αὐτῷ ἡ δόξα καὶ Tot ν. το, 


Σ Pet. ii. 
κράτος εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων. ἀμήν. 9: if 
ae . 2 Macc, 
7. “180d ἔρχεται * μετὰ τῶν νεφελῶν, καὶ ὄψεται αὐτὸν " πᾶς ii.17, Jos 
3 x A 9 > 2 ga 2 3 ee Ant. xx. 
ὀφθαλμὸς, καὶ οἵτινες αὐτὸν ἐξεκέντησαν - καὶ " κόψονται ἐπ᾽ αὐτὸν 9, Jub. 
“ ὡ ΤΣ δ, tah : ΧΥΪ. 13. 
πᾶσαι αἱ φυλαὶ τῆς γῆς. ναΐ - ἀμήν. u Cf. on xxi. 
97 (Ps. 
Ixxxviii. 


27) (LXX). 


; of. on Apoc. xiv. 14. 


9; from Hab. ili, 10, LXX. a John xi. 27 


y ‘ The world,” Did. xvi.; cf. Matt. xxvi. 64. 


v Resuming tréay. Same doxology as in 1 Pet. iv. 11 ; see also Mk. xiii. 26, 2 Thess. 
i. 9, ἐπα ee in Camb. Texts and Stud. i. (1891) 168 f. i 
4 Esd. xiii. 


w xvi. 15. x Mk. xiii. 26, xiv. 62, 


Z xviii. 


1 βασιλεις και (P, τ, 28, 36, etc., And.) is one of several glosses introduced (like 
tepav or ἱερατικὴν of Syr., S. for vepers, or nuwv of C, Lat. for μας) to ease the 
difficulty of the original βασιλειαν (pQ*AC, etc., vg., Syr., Areth., edd.) [like veparevpa 


τ Pet. ii. 5, 9]. 


καὶ ἐποίησεν, the harsh anacolouthon 
breaks up the participial construc- 
tion. ἡμᾶς, emphatic. ‘‘ We Christians 
are now the chosen people. In us the 
Danielic prophecy of a reign of the saints 
is fulfilled and is to be fulfilled.” This 
is a characteristically anti-Jewish note. 
Persecution (cf. 1 Peter ii. 5) deepened 
the sense of continuity in the early Chris- 
tians, who felt driven back on the truth 
of election and divine protection; they 
were the true successors of all noble suf- 
ferers in Israel who had gone before (cf. 
the argument of Heb. xi. 32—xii. 2). In 
the Apocalypse the Christian church is 
invariably the true Israel, including all 
who believe in Christ, irrespective of 
birth and nationality. God reigns over 
them, and they reign, or will reign, over 
the world. In fact, Christians now and 
here are what Israel hoped to become, 
viz., priest-princes of God, and this posi- 
tion has been won for them by a messiah 
whom the Jews had rejected, and whom 
all non-Christians will have to acknow- 
ledge as sovereign. According to rab- 
binic tradition, the messianic age would 
restore to Israel the priestly standing 
which it had lost by its worship of the 
golden calf; and by the first command- 
ment (Mechilta on Exod. xx. 2), “slaves 
became kings”. There may also be an 
implicit anti-Roman allusion. We Chris- 
tians, harried and despised, are a com- 
munity with a great history and a greater 
hope. Our connection with Christ makes 
us truly imperial. The adoration of 
Christ, which vibrates in this doxology 
4cf. Expos.® v. 302-307), is one of the most 
impressive features of the book. The 
prophet feels that the one hope for the 
loyalists of God in this period of trial is 
<o be conscious that they owe everything 


to the redeeming love of Jesus. Faith- 
fulness depends on faith, and faith is 
rallied by the grasp not of itself but of its 
object. Mysterious explanations of his- 
tory follow, but it is passionate devotion 
to Jesus, and not any skill in exploring 
prophecy, which proves the source of 
moral heroism in the churches. Jesus 
sacrificed himself for us; αὐτῷ ἡ δόξα. 
From this inward trust and wonder, 
which leap up at the sight of Jesus and 
his grace, the loyalty of Christians flows. 

This enthusiasm for Jesus naturally 
carries the prophet’s mind forward (7, 8) 
to the time when the Lord’s majesty will 
flash out on mankind. He resumes the 
line of thought interrupted by the doxol- 
ogy of 55-6, 

Ver. 7. A reminiscence and adaptation of 
Dan. vii. 13 (Theod.) and Zech. xii. 10-14. 
The substitution of ἐξεκέντησαν (so John 
xix. 37, Justin’s Aol. i. 52, Dial. xxxii., 
cf. \xi., cxviii., adding eis) for κατωρχ- 
σαντο (LXX mistranslation in this 
passage, though not elsewhere, of 77) 


—shows that the original text was used 
(though Liicke and Ewald hold that ἐξ. 
was the LXX reading till Origen), and that 
it was interpreted in some (Johannine? 
Abbott, Diatessarica, 1259-1262, 2317) 
circles as a prophecy of the crucifixion. 
Only, the reference is no longer to repent- 
ance (Zech.), but, by a turn of character- 
istic severity, to remorse and judgment. 
There is a remarkable parallel in Matt. 
xxiv. 30, where patristic tradition (cf. 
A. C. 233-36) early recognised in τὸ 
σημεῖον τ. v. a. the cross itself, made 
visible on the day of judgment. The 
first of the three signs preceding Christ’s 
advent in the clouds, acc. to Did. xvi. 6 
(cf. Zech. ii. 13 LXX), is σημεῖον ἐκπετά- 


540 
b Cf. Riedel 
OR 


> a 

9. Ἔγω 
patristic 
reference 

of this verse to Jesus is defended by Abbott, 

d Isa. xliv. 6, Amos iv. 13; except (Cit.) 2 Cor. vi. 


17 f., in connection with retribution; cf. R. J. 305, and Kattenbusch (ii. 533 f.). 


Dan. vii. 2, Ex. xii. 3, 4 Esd. ii. 42, etc. 


σεως ἐν οὐρανῷ (Christ with outstretched 
arms, as crucified ἢ); and, acc. to Barn. 
vii. 9, “they shall see him on that day 
wearing about his flesh τὸν ποδήρη 
κόκκινον ". Note (a) that the agreement 
with John xix. 37 is mainly verbal; the 
latter alludes to the crucifixion, this pas- 
sage to an eschatological crisis. (b) No 
such visible or victorious return of Christ 
is fulfilled in the Apocalypse, for visions 
like xiv. 14 f., xix. 12 f., do not adequately 
correspond to i. 7, xxii. 12, etc. (c) No 
punishment of the Jews occurs at Christ’s 
return, for the vengeance of xix. 13 f. 
falls on pagans, while xi. 13 lies on an- 
other plane. καὶ, x.t.A.: the monoto- 
nous collocation of clauses (Vit. i. 9-16) 
throughout the Apocalypse with καί, is 
not necessarily a Hebraism ; the syntax of 
Aristotle (e.g., cf. Thumb, 129), betrays a 
similar usage. καὶ ott. k.7.A., Selected as 
a special class (kal τότε μετανοήσουσιν, 
ὅτε οὐδὲν ὠφελήσουσι, Justin). The re- 
sponsibility of the Jews, as opposed to 
the Romans, for the judicial murder of 
Jesus is prominent in the Christian litera- 
ture of the period (Luke-Acts, cf. von 
Dobschiitz in Texte τι. Unters. xi. I, pp. 
61, 62), though the Apoc. is superior 
to passages like 2 Clem. xvii. πᾶσαι 
k.t.A.=the unbelieving pagans, who are 
still impenitent when surprised by the 
Lord’s descent (éri=‘ because of,” of. 
xviii. 9. in diff. sense); a realistic state- 
ment of what is spiritually put in John 
xvi. 8, 9.—This forms an original element 
in the early Christian apologetic. To 
the Jewish taunt, ‘‘ Jesus is not messiah 
but a false claimant: he died,” the reply 
was, “ He will return in visible messianic 
authority ” (Mark xiv. 62= Matt. xxvi. 64, 
significant change in Luke xxii. 69). In 
several circles this future was conceived 
not as a return of Jesus, nor in connexion 
with his historical appearance, but as the 
first real manifestation of the true messi- 
anic character which he had gained at 
the resurrection (cf. Titius, 31, 32). See 
on xii. 4 f. vat, ἀμήν: a double (Gk. 
Heb.) ratification of the previous oracle. 

Ver. 8. Only here and in xxi. 5 ἢ. is 
God introduced as the speaker, in the 


ATIOKAAYYVIZ ITQANNOY I 


8. ‘Eye εἶμι τὸ ἄλφα καὶ τὸ 3,” λέγει κύριος ὃ θεός, οὗ ὧν 
καὶ ὁ ἦν καὶ ὁ ἐρχόμενος, 6 * παντοκράτωρ. 
“Ἰωάννης, ὁ ἀδελφὸς ὑμῶν καὶ συγκοινωνὸς ἐν τῇ θλίψει 


182 f., cf. Isa. xli. 4, xliii. 10, ete. c Ver. 4. 
18, only in Apoc. (ἢ) in N.T. Here, as 3 Macc. vi.. 
δ. X53, 18; 


Apocalypse. The advent of the Christ, 
which marks the end of the age, is brought 
about by God, who overrules {(παντο- 
κράτωρ always of God in Apocalypse, 
otherwise the first part of the title might 
have suggested Christ) even the anomalies 
and contradictions of history for this provi- 
dential climax. By the opening of the 
second century πατὴρ παντοκράτωρ had 
become the first title of God in the Ro- 
man creed; the Apocalypse, indifferent to 
the former epithet, reproduces the latter 
owing to its Hebraic sympathies. ἐγώ 
εἶμι: Coleridge used to declare that one 
chief defect in Spinoza was that the 
Jewish philosopher started with I¢ is in- 
stead of with I am. τὸ ἄλφα καὶ τὸ ὦ: 
not the finality (Oesterley, Encycl. Relig. 
and Ethics, i. 1, 2), but the all-inclusive 
power of God, which comes fully into 
play in the new order of things inaugu- 
rated by the second advent. The sym- 
bolism which is here put in a Greek form 
had been developed in rabbinic specula- 


tion upon ΣΝ: + With this and the fol- 
lowing passage, cf. the papyrus of Ani 
(E. B. D. 12): “ He leadeth in his train 
that which is and that which is not yet. 
. . . Homage to thee, King of kings, 
and Lord of lords, who from the womb 
of Nut hast ruled the world and Akert 
[the Egyptian Hades]. Thy body is of 
bright and shining metal, thy head is of 
azure blue, and the brilliance of the tur- 
quoise encircleth thee.” For the con- 
nexion of a presentiment of the end (7, 8) 
with an impulse to warn contemporaries 
(9 f.) see 4 Esd. xiv. το f., where the 
warning of the world’s near close is fol- 
lowed by an injunction to the prophet 
to ‘‘set thine house in order, reprove 
thy people, console the humble among 
them”; whereupon the commission to 
write under inspiration is given. 

i. Q-iii. 22, an address to Asiatic Chris- 
tendom (as represented by seven chur- 
ches) which in high prophetic and ora- 
cular style rallies Christians to their 
genuine oracle of revelation in Jesus and 
his prophetic spirit. At a time when 
local oracles (for the famous one of. 
Apollo near Miletus, see Friedlander, iii. 


o—9. 


ATIOKAAYVIS ITQANNOY 


341 


“-“ 3 a , 3 ~ , ~ 
καὶ βασιλείᾳ καὶ ᾿ὑπομονῇ ἐν Ἰησοῦ, ἐγενόμην ἐν TH νήσῳ τῇ f Keynote 


καλουμένῃ Πάτμῳ “διὰ τὸν λόγον τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ τὴν μαρτυρίαν 


19, Clem. Rom. xxxv., etc. 
practically (cf. Eus., H.E.., iii 18, 1-3). 


561 f.), besides those in Greece and Syria 
and Egypt, were eagerly frequented, it 
was of moment to lay stress on what had 
superseded ail such media for the faithful. 
Cf. Minuc. Felix, Oct. 7, ‘‘pleni et mixti 
deo uates futura praecerpunt, dant caute- 
lam periculis, morbis medelam, spem 
afflictis, operam miseris, solacium calami- 
tatibus, laboribus leuamentum”. 

i. Q-20, introductory vision. 

Ver. 9. The personality of the seer is 
made prominent in apocalyptic literature, 
to locate or guarantee any visions which 
are to follow. Here the authority with 
which this prophet is to speak is condi- 
tioned by his kinship of Christian exper- 
ience with the churches and his special 
revelation from God. ἀδελφός (cf. vi. 11, 
xii. 10): for its pagan use as=fellow- 
member of the same (religious) society, 
of. C. B. P. i. 96 f., and Dittenberger’s 
Sylloge Inscr. Graec. 474, το (ἀδελφοὶ 
ols κοινὰ τὰ πατρῷα). θλίψει, put first 
as the absorbing fact of their experi- 
ence, and as a link of sympathy between 
writer and readers; καὶ βασιλείᾳ, the 
outcome of θλίψις in the messianic 
order: distress no end in itself; καὶ 
ὑπομονῇ» patient endurance the moral 
condition of participation in ἡ θλίψις 
and ἣ βασιλεία, by which one is nerved 
to endure the presence of the former 
without breaking down, and to bear the 
temporary delay of the latter without 
impatience. While μακροθυμία is the 
absence of resentment at wrong, to- 
fovy =not giving way under trials. See 
Barn. ii., “the aids of our faith are fear 
and patience, long-suffering and _ self- 
control are our allies’; also Tertul- 
lian’s famous aphorism, ‘‘ ubi Deus, ibi 
et alumna eius, patientia scilicet”. —év 
Ἰησοῦ (a Pauline conception, only re- 
peated in Apocalypse at xiv. 13), either 
with all three substantives or merely 
(cf. 2 Thess. iii. 5) with ὑπομονή. In 
any case tm. is closely linked to ἐν 
*I.; such patience, as exemplified in 
Jesus, and inspired by him, was the car- 
dinal virtue of the Apocalypse and its 
age. In the early Christian literature of 
this period ‘‘we cannot name anything 
upon which blessedness is so frequently 
made to rest, as upon the exercise of 
patient endurance”? (Titius, 142). ἐγενό- 


VOL. V. 


of age, 

Heb. vi. 
12, x. 36, 
Lk. xxi. 


g In sense of vi. 9, xx. 4, cf. Epict. Diss. iii. 24, 113. διὰ = ἕνεκεν 


μην ἐν (“I found myself in”: implying 
that when he wrote he was no longer 
there), not by flowing waters (as ἴτε- 
quently, ¢.g., En. xiii. 7), but in the small, 
treeless, scantily populated island of Pat- 
mos, one of the Sporades, whither crimi- 
nals were banished sometimes by the 
Roman authorities (Plin. Hist. Nat. iv. 
12, 23). Relegatio to an island was not 
an infrequent form of punishment for 
better-class offenders or suspects under 
the black régime of Domitian, as under 
Diocletian for Christians (cf. Introd. 
§ 6). No details are given, but probably 
it meant hard labour in the quarries, and 
was inflicted by the pro-consul of Asia 
Minor. Why John was only banished, 
we do not know. As “the word of God 
and the witness of Jesus” are not quali- 
fied by any phrase such as ὅσα εἶδεν 
(ver. 2, and thereby identified with the 
present Apocalypse), the words indicate 
as elsewhere (cf. διὰ, «.7.A., reff.) the 
occasion of his presence in Patmos, i.¢., 
his loyalty to the gospel (cf. θλίψις), 
rather than the object of his visit. 
The latter could hardly be evangelising 
(Spitta), for Patmos was insignificant 
and desolate, nor, in face of the use of 
διὰ, can the phrase mean “for the pur- 
pose of receiving this revelation” (Bleek, 
Liicke, Duisterdieck, Hausrath, B. Weiss, 
Baljon, etc.). Either he had voluntarily 
withdrawn from the mainland to escape 
the stress of persecution (which scarcely 
harmonises with the context or the gen- 
eral temper of the book) or for solitary 
communion (cf. Ezek. i. 1-3), or, as is 
more likely, his removal was a punish- 
ment (cf. Abbott, 114-16). The latter 
view is corroborated by tradition (cf. 
Zahn, § 64, note 7), which, although 
later and neither uniform nor wholly 
credible, is strong enough to be taken as 
independent evidence. It can hardly be 
explained away as a mere elaboration 
of the present passage (so, eé.g., Reuss, 
Bleek, Bousset); the allusion to paprv- 
ριον is too slight to have been suggested 
by the darker sense of martyrdom, and it 
is far-fetched to argue that the tradition 
was due to a desire to glorify John with 
a martyrdom. Unless, therefore, the re- 
ference is a piece of literary fiction (in 
which case it would probably have beer 


22 


342 


ἢ (From 


Zech. i. 6, 
vii.12, etc. 
LXX), cf. 
trast γεν. ἐν ἑαυτῷ Acts xii. I. 


*Ingod. το. ἐγενόμην 


elaborated) it must be supposed to be 
vague simply because the matter was 
perfectly familiar to the circle for whom 
the book was written. It is to those 
exercised in prudence, temperance, and 
virtue that (according to Philo, de incor- 
rupt. mundi, § τ, cf. Plutarch’s discussion 
in defect. orac. 38 f.) God vouchsafes 
visions, but John introduces his personal 
experience in order to establish relations 
between himself and his readers rather 
than to indicate the conditions of his 
theophany. 

Ver. ro. Ecstasy or spiritual rapture, 
the supreme characteristic of prophets in 
Did. xi. 7 (where the unpardonable sin 
is to criticise a prophet λαλοῦντα ἐν 
πνεύματι), Was not an uncommon experi- 
ence in early Christianity, which was 
profoundly conscious of living in the long- 
looked for messianic age (Acts il. 17 f., 
cf. Eph. iii. 5), when such phenomena 
were to be amatter of course. Through- 
out the Apocalypse (xxi. 5, etc.) John 
first sees, then writes; the two are not 
simultaneous. While the Apocaiypse is 
thus the record of a vision (ὅρασις, ix. 17), 
the usual accompaniments of a vision— 
i.e., prayer and fasting—are significantly 
absent from the description of this in- 
augural scene, which is reticent and 
simple as compared, e¢.g., with a passage 
like Asc. Isd. iv. 10-16. It is possible, 
however, that the prophet was engaged 
in prayer when the trance or vision over- 
took him (like Peter, Acts x. 9-11, of. 
Ign. ad Polyc. ii. 2, τὰ δὲ ἀόρατα αἴτει, 
iva σοι φανερωθῇ), since the day of 
weekly Christian worship is specially 
mentioned on which, though separated 
from the churches (was there one at 
Patmos ὃ), he probably was wrapt in 
meditations (on the resurrection of Christ) 
appropriate to the hour. The Imperial 
or Lord’s day, first mentioned here in 
early Christian literature (so Did. xiv., 
Gosp. Peter 11, etc.) contains an implicit 
allusion to the ethnic custom, prevalent 
in Asia Minor, of designating the first 
day of the month (or week ?) as Σεβαστή 
in honour of the emperor's birthday (see 
Thieme’s Inschr. Maeander, 1906, 15, 
and Deissmann in E.Bi. 2813 ἔ.). Chris- 
tians, too, have their imperial day (ef. 
Introd. § 2), to celebrate the birthday of 
their heavenly king. With his mind 
absorbed in the thought of the exalted 


ATIOKAAY¥IZ IQANNOY Ἔ 


ἐν πνεύματι ἐν τῇ κυριακῇ ἡμέρᾳ: καὶ 


iv. 2, xxi. 10; condition of vision, Acts vii. 55; = ἐν ἐκστάσει (Acts xi. 5, xxii. 17), con- 


Jesus and stored with O.T. messianic 
conceptions from Daniel and Ezekiel, 
the prophet had the following ecstasy in 
which the thoughts of Jesus and of the 
church already present to his mind are 
fused into one vision. He recalls in 
spirit the usual church-service with its 
praises, prayers, sudden voices, and 
silences. (Compare Ign. Magn. ix. εἰ 
οὖν οἱ ἐν παλαιοῖς πράγμασιν ἄναστρα- 
φέντες εἰς καινότητα ἐλπίδος ἦλθον, 
μηκέτι σαββατίζοντες ἀλλὰ κατὰ κυρια- 
κὴν ζῶντες, ἐν ἧ καὶ ἣ ζωὴ ἡμῶν ἀνέ- 
τειλεν δι᾽ αὐτοῦ καὶ τοῦ θανάτου αὐτοῦ 
- +» καὶ διὰ τοῦτο ὑπομένομεν.) John’s 
service of God (ver. 2) involved suffer- 
ing, instead of exempting him from the 
trials of ordinary Christians; the subse- 
quent visions and utterances prove not 
merely that in his exile he had fallen 
back upon the O.T. prophets for conso- 
lation but that (cf. 2 Cor. xi. 28, 29) he 
was anxiously brooding over the condi- 
tion of his churches on the mainland. 
Cf. Dio Chrys. Orat. xiii. 422, where the 
philosopher dates the consciousness of 
his vocation from the period of his exile. 
Upon the other hand, the main criterion 
of a false prophet (Eus. H. E. v. 17, 2), 
apart from covetousness, was speech 
ἐν παρεκστάσει, i.e., the arrogant, igno- 
rant, frenzied rapture affected by pagan 
Cagliostros, who were destitute of any 
unselfish religious concern for other 
people. ὀπίσω pov, the regular method 
of spiritualistic voices and appearances : 
σάλπιγγος, loud and clear, not an un- 
usual expression for voices heard in a 
trance (cf. Martyr. Polyc. xxii. 2, Moscow 
MS.). The following Christophany falls 
into rhythmical expression. As a revela- 
tion of the Lord (ver. 1, cf. 2 Cor. xii. 1), 
with which we may contrast Emerson’s 
saying (‘I conceive a man as always 
spoken to from behind and unable to 
turn his head and see the speaker”), it 
exhibits several of the leading functions 
discharged by Jesus in the Apocalypse, 
where he appears as (a) the revealer of 
secrets (i. 1 f., v. 5), (Ὁ) the guardian and 
champion of the saints (ii., iii., etc.), (c) 
the medium, through sacrifice, of their 
relationship to God, (d) associated with 
God in rewarding them, and (e) in the 
preliminary overthrow of evil which ac- 
companies the triumph of righteousness. 
Compare the main elements of the divine 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


10—13. 343 
ἤκουσα | ὀπίσω pou φωνὴν μεγάλην “ds σάλπιγγος 11. ᾿λεγούσης, i C/. Ἐκεῖ, 


“0 βλέπεις γράψον εἰς βιβλίον καὶ πέμψον “tats ἑπτὰ ἐκκλη- κ δε φωνήν; 


σίαις, εἰς Ἔφεσον καὶ εἰς Σμύρναν 1 καὶ εἰς Πέργαμον καὶ εἰς Θυάτειρα ret oand 
καὶ εἰς Σάρδεις καὶ εἰς Φιλαδελφίαν καὶ εἰς Λαοδικίαν ”. Fie λλμ 
12. Καὶ ἐπέστρεψα " βλέπειν τὴν φωνὴν ἥτις ἐλάλει μετ᾽ ἐμοῦ - ie, aloo 
καὶ ἐπιστρέψας εἶδον ἑπτὰ ° λυχνίας χρυσᾶς, pion 1). 

13. καὶ ἐν μέσῳ " τῶν λυχνιῶν ὅμοιον ἢ υἱὸν ἀνθρώπου ᾿ plc 
attract.to 


ᾷ Ἢ σ. instead 
m ii. 8, etc., xxii. 16. For ἐκκλ. cf. on 1 Thess. 1.2. Ὁ Cf. Jos., Ant., ix. 4, 59 


of φ. 3 
p Cf. xiv. 14, Ez. 1. 26, from Dan, vii. 13 (cf. Abbott, 175), 


© Exod. xxxvii. 23 (cf. Abbott; 194 f,). 


1 For the orthography of Σμυρναν (ζμυρναν $Y, vg.) see on ii. 8. 

2 Almost invariably AC, like A (LXX), write eppeow for ev peow (cf. Meisterhans, 
Gramm. d. att. Inschr., 110 f.): the original viov (of $9Q, 1, etc., Andc, so Ti., WH, 
Simcox, Bj., Swete, Bousset) has been corrected, as at xiv. 14, into vw by ACP, etc., 
Cyp., Ar. (so Al., Ws., WH marg.): the μαστοις (am. Aey. in this sense) of CPQ, 
min., Ar. (edd.) has also been corrected into μασθοις (δῷ, min., Ti.) or even pafots 
(A, min., so Lach., Ws.); pafovs uirorum μαστοὺς (Luke, xxiii, 29) mulierum: 
χρυσαν, an irregular contraction, is smoothed out in ΡΟ into χρυσὴν (for the 


papyri-usage, cf. Class. Rev., 1901, 35). 


nature as conceived by the popular reli- 
gion of contemporary Phrygia, viz., (d) 
prophetic power, (Ὁ) healing and purify- 
ing power, and (c) divine authority (sym- 
bolised by the axe): C. B. P., ii. 357. 

Ver.11, γράψον (cf. Herm. Vis. 11. iv. 3); 
this emphasis put upon the commission 
to compose and circulate what he sees in 
the vision, is due to the author’s claim of 
canonical authority and reflects a time 
when a literary work of this nature still 
required some guarantee, although at an 
earlier date smaller oracles had been 
written and accepted (e.g., that which 
determined the flight of the early Chris- 
tians to Pella, Eus. H. E., iii. 5, 3). 
John’s réle, however, is passive in two 
senses of the term. He seldom acts or 
journeys in his vision, whereas Jewish 
apocalypses are full of the movements of 
their seers; nor does his vision lead to 
any practical course of action, for—un- 
like most of the O.T. prophets—he is not 
conscious of any commission to preach or 
to reform the world. The prophet is an 
author. His experience is to be no luxury 
but a diffused benefit ; and as in Tob. xii. 
20 (‘and now .. . write in a book all that 
has taken place”) and 4 Esd. xii. 37 
(‘‘ therefore write in a book all thou hast 
seen, and thou shalt teach,” etc.), the 
prophet is careful to explain that compo- 
sition is no mere literary enterprise but 
due to a divine behest. The cities are 
enumerated from Ephesus northwards to 
Smyrna (forty miles) and Pergamos (fifty 
miles north of Smyrna), then across for 


forty miles S.E. to Thyatira, down to 
Sardis, Philadelphia (thirty miles S.E. of 
Sardis), and Laodicea (forty miles S.E. of 
Philadelphia). Cf. on ver. 4 and Introd. 
§ 2. Except Pergamos and Laodicea, 
the churches lay within Lydia (though 
the writer employs the imperial term for 
the larger province) which was at that 
period a by-word for voluptuous civilisa- 
tion. 

Ver. 12. The seven golden lamp-stands 
are cressets representing the seven chur- 
ches (20), the sevenfold lamp-stand of the 
Jewish temple (cf. S. C. 295-99) having 
been for long used as a symbol (Zech. 
iv. 2, 10). The function of the churches 
is to embody and express the light of the 
divine presence upon earth, so high is 
the prophet’s conception of the com- 
munities (cf. on ii. 4, 5); their duty is to 
keep the light burning and bright, other- 
wise the reason for their existence dis- 
appears (ii. 5). Consequently the prim- 
ary activity of Jesus in providence and 
revelation bears upon the purity of those 
societies through which his influence is 
to reach mankind, just.as his connexion 
with them on the other hand assures 
them of One in heaven to whom out of 
difficulties here they can appeal with 
confidence. 

Ver. 13. The churches are inseparable 
from their head and centre Jesus, who 
moves among the cressets of his temple 
with the dignity and authority of a high 
priest. The anarthrous v. 4. is the 
human appearance of the celestial mes- 


344 
q Only here 
in N.T.: 


Sir. xxvii ζώνην χρυσᾶν. 


1 


tds χιών" 


xlvi. 1. 


t From En. xiv. 20 (cvi. 2, 10), cf. Matt. xxviii. 3, Slav. Ἐπ. i. 5, xxxvii. 1. 


XXiii. 19-20, Hom. Iliad, xiii. 474. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY ἃ 
ἐνδεδυμένον “ποδήρη καὶ " περιεζωσμένον πρὸς τοῖς μαστοῖς 
14. ἡ δὲ κεφαλὴ αὐτοῦ καὶ αἱ τρίχες λευκαὶ ὡς ἔριον λευκόν, 


καὶ οἱ ὀφθαλμοὶ αὐτοῦ ὡς “ φλὸξ πυρός " 


U ii. 18, xix. 12, Sir. 


1For a late variant (av tp. A. woet ep. και το evd. αὐτου A. ws χιων), conforming 
the words to Daniel, cf. Simcox in Expos.’ iv. 316-318. 


siah, as in En. xlvi. 1-6 (where the Son 
of man accompanies God, who, as the 
Head of Days, had a head ‘white as 
wool”) and Asc. Isa. xi. τ. The difficult 
ὅμοιον is to be explained (with Vit. ii. 
127, 223, 227) as=as (ii. 18, vi. 14, ix. 
7, 8, xxi. II) or οἷον, “ something like,” a 
loose reproduction of the Heb. (‘‘un étre 
semblable 4 nous, un homme”). The 
whole passage illustrates the writer’s 
habit of describing an object or person 
by heaping up qualities without strict 
regard to natural or grammatical collo- 
cation. ποδήρης (sc. χιτὼν or ἐσθής), a 
long robe reaching to the feet, was an 
oriental mark of dignity (cf. oni. 7, and 
Ezek. ix. 2, 11, LXX), denoting high 
rank or office such as that of Parthian 
kings or of the Jewish high priest who 
wore a purple one. High girding (with 
a belt?) was another mark of lofty 
position, usually reserved for Jewish 
priests, though the Iranians frequently 
appealed to their deities as “‘high-girt” 
(t.e., ready for action=cf. Yasht xv. 54, 
57, ‘‘ Vaya of the golden girdle, high- 
up girded, swift moving, as powerful in 
sovereignty as any absolute sovereign in 
the world”). The golden buckle or πόρπη 
was part of the insignia of royalty and 
its φίλοι (τ Macc. x. 8,9, xi. 58). The 
author thus mixes royal and sacerdotal 
colours on his palette to heighten the 
majesty of Christ’s appearance. New, 
golden (as in Iranian eschatology), shin- 
ing, white—are the usual adjectives which 
he employs throughout the book for the 
transcendent bliss of the life beyond and 
its heavenly tenants; “‘ golden” had been 
used already in Greek as a synonym for 
precious, excellent, divine. 

Ver. 14. ὡς x.; another conventional 
simile for celestial beings. 4K. K. at τ΄» 
a pleonastic expression; either = ‘‘his 
head, t.e. his hair,” or ‘‘his forehead 
and his hair”; scarcely a hendiadys for 
“the hair of the head” (Bengel). 
Jewish tradition rationalised the white 


hairs into a proof of God’s activity as 
a wise old teacher (Chag. 14, cf. Prov. 
xx. 27 f.), and the Daniel-vision might 
suggest the fine paradox between the 
divine energy and this apparent sign of 
weakness. But such traits are probably 
poetical, not allegorical, in John’s vision; 
they body forth his conception of Jesus as 
divine. In Egyptian theology a similar 
trait belongs to Ani after beatification. 
The whole conception of the messiah in 
the Apocalypse resembles that outlined 
in Enoch (Similitudes, xxxvii.-lxxi.), where 
he also possesses pre-existence as Son of 
man (xlviii.) sits on his throne of glory 
(xlvii. 3) for judgment, rules all men 
(Ixii. 6), and slays the wicked with the 
word of his mouth (lxii. 2); but this 
particular transference to the messiah 
(i. 14, 17, 18, ii. 8, xxii. 12, 13), of what is. 
in Daniel predicated of God as the world- 
judge, seems to form a specifically N.T. 
idea, unmediated even in Enoch (xlvi. 1), 
although the association of priestly and’ 
judicial attributes with those of royalty 
was easy for an Oriental (it is predicated 
of the messiah by Jonathan ben Usiel on 
Zech. iv. 12, 13). ὡς φλὸξ πυρός, like 
Slav. En. i. 5, from Dan. x. 6; cf. Suet. 
August. 79, “‘oculos habuit claros et 
nitidos, quibus etiam existimari uoluit 
inesse quiddam diuini uigoris ; gaudebat- 
que si quis sibi acrius contuenti quasi 
ad fulgorem solis uultum submitteret”. 
Divine beauty was generally manifested 
(Verg. Aen. v. 647 f.) in glowing eyes (in- 
sight and indignation), the countenance 
and the voice; here also (ver. 15) in feet 
to crush all opposition. The messiah is. 
not crowned, however (cf. later, xix. 12). 
X-=some hard (as yet unidentified) metal 
which gleamed after smelting. The most 
probable meaning of this obscure hybria 
term is that suggested by Suidas: χαλ- 
κολίβανον - εἶδος ἠλέκτρου τιμιώτερου 
χρυσοῦ, ἔστι δὲ τὸ ἤλεκτρον ἀλλότυπον. 
χρυσίον μεμιγμένον ὑέλῳ καὶ λιθείᾳ (HA. 
actually occurring in LXX, Ezek. i. 27)- 


14—17. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ ILQANNOY 


345 


15. Kal οἱ πόδες αὐτοῦ ὅμοιοι "χαλκολιβάνῳ, ὡς ἐν καμίνῳ v ii. 18, cf. 


πεπυρωμένης * | 


καὶ “ ἡ φωνὴ αὐτοῦ ὡς φωνὴ ὑδάτων πολλῶν - 
16. καὶ " ἔχων ἐν τῇ δεξιᾷ χειρὶ αὐτοῦ ἀστέρας ἑπτά - 


Ezek. 1. 7 

(LXX). 
w Ezek. i. 

24, xliili. 2 

(Heb.), 

4 Esd. vi. 


κ᾿ a A a 17. 
καὶ "ἐκ τοῦ στόματος αὐτοῦ ῥομφαία δίστομος ὀξεῖα ἐκ- χα Pres. ptc. 


πορευομένη * 


4 A , ~ “ 
καὶ “ἡ ὄψις αὐτοῦ ὡς ὃ ἥλιος φαίνει ἐν τῇ δυνάμει αὐτοῦ. 


= pres. 
indic. 
(Heb. 
idiom ?) 
as often. 


ἃ hs 
17. Kat ὅτε εἶδον αὐτόν, "ἔπεσα πρὸς τοὺς πόδας αὐτοῦ dsy > Thess. 


νεκρός - καὶ ἢ" ἔθηκεν τὴν δεξιὰν αὐτοῦ ἐπ᾽ ἐμὲ λέγων, “Μὴ φοβοῦ: 


z Judg. v. 31, Slav. En. i. 5, xix. 1. 


ii. 8, cf. 

4Esd. xiii. 
4, το, ang 
Isa.xlix.2. 


a Isa. vi. 5, Dan. viii. 1%18, x. 17-19, En. xiv. 13-14, 19, 24-25, 
Slav. En. i. 7-8, Tob xii. 16, Add. Esth, xv. 15, Matt. xxviil. 4. 


Dan. x. 10, 12. 


1 πεπυρωμενοι (PQ, etc., And., Ar., so Al., WH marg.) and mervpwpeva(s9, min., 
vg., Sah., Syr., S., Aeth., Vict., so Ti, Bj., Bs., Holtzm.) seem variant corrections of 
the original genitive memvpwpevns (AC, so Lach., Tr., WH, Ws., Sw.)—Pr. = sicut 


de fornace ignea. 


The reference then is to amber or to some 
composition like brass or (copper) bronze; 
only, it contains gold (cf. vulg. = aurichal- 
cum, a valuable and gleaming metal). 
Abbott (201) sees a corruption of some 
phrase like χαλκὸν ἐν κλιβάνῳ, while 


others suggest χαλκός and Ὁ (ἰ.6., 


glowing white brass). Haussleiter would 
upon inadequate grounds omit ὡς ἐκ. k. 
mem. (219-24). 

Ver. 16. The care and control exer- 
cised by Christ over the churches only 
come forward after the suggestions of 
majesty and authority (13-15) which 
followed the initial idea of Christ’s 
central position (ἐν μέσῳ) among the 
churches. Cf. v. 6 (ἐν μέσῳ) for another 
reference to Christ’s central authority— 
ἔχων, κιτιλ. For the astrological back- 
ground of this figure, cf. Jeremias 24 f. 
The traditional symbol, of which an 
interpretation is given later (ver. 20), 
probably referred to the seven planets 
rather than to the Pleiades or any other 
constellation. Ifthe description is to be 
visualised, the seven stars may be pic- 
tured as lying on Christ’s palm in the 
form of the stars in the constellation of 
Ursa Major—pfopdata, κιτιλ. By a 
vivid objectifying of the divine word 
(corresponding to that, e.g., in Isa. ix. 
8 f., ix. 4, and suggested by the tongue- 
shaped appearance of the short Roman 
sword or dagger), the figure of the sharp 
sword issuing from the mouth is applied 
(in Ps. Sol. xvii. 27, 39, as here) to the 
messiah, as in Jewish literature to God 
(Ps. cxlix. 6, etc.) and to wisdom (Sap. 
xViii. 15), elsewhere to the λόγος τοῦ 


θεοῦ (Heb. iv. 12, cf. Apoc. xix. 13-15): 
Christ’s power of reproof and punish- 
ment is to be directed against the church 
(ii. 12 f.) as well as against the world of 
heathen opposition (xix. 21, where the 
trait is artistically moreappropriate). As 
a nimbus or coronata radiata sometimes 
crowned the emperor (“‘ image des rayons 
lumineux qu’il lance sur le monde,” Beur- 
lier), so the face of Christ (ὄψις as in John 
xi. 44, cf. below, x. 1) is aptly termed, 
as in the usual description of angelic 
visitants (reff.), bright as sunshine un- 
intercepted by mist or clouds. This is 
the climax of the delineation. 

Ver. 17. ἔπεσα «.7.X., the stereo- 
typed behaviour (cf. Num. xxiv. 4) in 
such apocalyptic trances (Weinel, 129, 
52, ike ἧς 975) Σ᾽} fOr ‘the. ἘΕΙΣΟΣ 68 
spiritual experience cf. Schiller’s lines; 
“ Schrecklich ist es Deiner Wahrheit 
| Sterbliches Gefass zu seyn”); Jesus, 
however, does here what Michael (En. 
Ixxi. 3) or some other friendly angel 
does in most Jewish apocalypses. There 
is no dialogue between the prophet and 
Christ, as there is afterwards between 
him and the celestial beings—py ¢. 
The triple reassurance is (1) that the 
mysterious, overwhelming Figure reveals 
his character, experience and authority, 
instead of proving an alien unearthly 
visitant; (2) the vision has a practical 
object (‘‘ write,” 10) bearing upon hu- 
man life, and (3) consequently the 
mysteries are not left as baffling enigmas. 
All the early Christian revelations which 
are self-contained, presuppose the risen 
Christ as their source; the Apocalypse 
of Peter, being fragmentary, is hardly 


346 


ς Isa. xliv. 
6, xlviii. 
12, cf. 
below on 
ili. 14. 

d Cf. xxii. 
3, 16f. I 

e Job xxxviii. 17, Sap. xvi. 13. 


“ A 
ἐγώ εἰμι °G πρῶτος kat 


3 


, A ~ τὸ 
θανάτου καὶ τοῦ adou. 


f = κλεῖδας (Helbing 40). 
the grave, see Rohde’s Psyche (1894), 491 f., 673 f. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 7 


eda» 2.» , , ‘ 
ὁ “ἔσχατος, 18. kai} ἐγενόμην νεκρός καὶ 
ἰδοὺ ζῶν εἰμὶ εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων - “Kal ἔχω τὰς κλεῖς ® τοῦ 
19. Γράψον οὖν ἃ εἶδες, καὶ ἃ εἰσὶ καὶ ἃ 


g Gen. obj. For Hades = θαν. or 


10m. και ο fv, after εσχατος, with primitive Latin text (Pr., Tic., Beatus, etc.), 
Haussl. 218-220, Wellh. The words (a tharginal gloss., from Katt. £. €.?) are more 
likely to have been added (and retained for their bearing on Christ’s pre-existence) 


than omitted; they add nothing to the sense or continuity of the passage. 


The 


expression is used of God in iv. 9-10, as of Yahveh in O.T. SQ om. καὶ (“If ο Cov 
was a marginal note, it would enter the text at first without kat,” Simcox). 


an exception to the rule. The present 
vision presents him as superhuman, 
messianic, militant and divine. But the 
writer is characteristically indifferent to 
the artistic error of making Christ’s right 
hand at once hold seven stars and be 
laid on the seer (16, 17). C/. the fine 
application of the following passage by 
Milton in his “ Remonstrant’s Defence”’. 
The whole description answers to what 
is termed, in modern psychology, a ‘‘ pho- 
tism ”. 

Ver. 18. Not “it is I, the first and 
the last” (which would require ἐγώ εἰμι 
before μὴ φοβοῦ), but “I am, etc.” 
The eternal life of the exalted Christ is a 
comfort both in method and result; 
ἐγενόμην νεκρός (not ὡς ; really dead), 
his experience assuring men of sym- 
pathy and understanding; καὶ ἰδοὺ, 
κτλ.» his victory and authority over 
death=an assurance of his power to 
rescue his own people from the grim 
prison of the underworld (Hades, cf. 
3 Macc. v. 50, the intermediate abode of 
the dead, being as usual personified in 
connexion with death). A background 
for this conception lies in the. primitive 
idea of Janus, originally an Italian sun- 
god, as the key-holder (cf. Ovid’s Fasiz, 
i. 129, 130, Hor. Carm. Sec. 9, 10) who 
opens and closes the day (sun = deus 
clauiger), rather than in Mithraism 
which only knew keys of heaven, or 
in Mandean religion (Cheyne’s Bible 
Problems, 102-106). The key was a 
natural Oriental symbol for authority 
and power (cf. in this book, iii. 7, ix. I, 
xx. I). Jewish belief (see GfrGrer, i. 
377-378) assigned three keys or four 
exclusively to God (‘‘ quos neque angelo 
neque seraphino committit’); these in- 
cluded, according to different views, 
“clauis sepulchorum,” “clavis uitae,” 
“ clauis resurrectionis mortuorum’’. To 
ascribe this divine prerogative to Jesus as 
the divine Hero who had mastered death 


is, therefore, another notable feature 
in the high Christology of this book. 
For the whole conception see E. B. D. 
ch. Ixiv. (fifth century B.c.?): “I am 
Yesterday and To-day and To-morrow 
. . . Iam the Lord of the men who are 
raised again; the Lord who cometh 
forth from out of the darkness.”’ It is 
based on the theophany of the Ancient 
of Days in Dan. vii. 9 f. (yet cf. x. 5, 6), 
who bestows on the ideal Israel (ὡς vids 
ἀνθ.) dominion. John changes this into 
a Christophany, like the later Jewish tra- 
dition which saw in vids &. a personal, 
divine messiah. When one remembers 
the actual position of affairs, the confi- 
dent faith of such passages is seen to 
have been little short of magnificent. 
To this Christian prophet, spokesman of 
a mere ripple upon a single wave of dis- 
sent in the broad ocean of paganism, 
history and experience find unity and 
meaning nowhere but in the person of 
a blameless Galilean peasant who had 
perished as a criminal in Jerusalem. 
So would such early Christian expecta- 
tions appear to an outsider. He would 
be Staggered by the extraordinary claims 
advanced on behalf of its God by this 
diminutive sect, perhaps more than 
staggered by the prophecy that imperial 
authority over the visible and invisible 
worlds lay ultimately in the hands of 
this deity, whose power was not limited 
to his own adherents.—Christophanies 
were commissions either to practical 
service (Acts x. 19, etc.), or, as here, so 
composition. 

Ver. 19. οὖν, at the command of him 
who has authority over the other world 
and the future (resuming ver. II. now 
that the paralysing fear of ver. 17 has 
been removed). Like the author of 4th 
Esdras, this prophet is far more interested 
in history than in the chronological 
speculations which engrossed many of the 
older apocalyptists. The sense of γράψον 


18—20., 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 347 


μέλλει γενέσθαι: μετὰ ταῦτα. 20. "1d μυστήριον τῶν ἑπτὰ ἀστέρων h Anacolou- 


ous εἶδες ἐπὶ τῆς δεξιᾶς μου, καὶ τὰς ἑπτὰ λυχνίας τὰς χρυσᾶς--- 


thon, μ = 
nom. pen- 
dens, A. 
irreg. at- 
tracted into case of οὕς after εἶδες 


1For yweo@ar [Luke xxi. 36] (NcA, 1, 38, etc., Ande, Areth., WH, Bs., Bj., 
Sw., Lach.) read γενεσθαι (ἡ ΟΡ, etc., Andpal, Al. Ti., Ws.). 


K.T.A. is not, write the vision already 
seen (ἃ εἶδες, i. 10-18), the present (ἃ 
εἰσὶν, i. 20-iii, 20, the state of the 
churches, mainly conceived as it exists 
now and here), and the future (ἃ μέλλει 
γενέσθαι μετὰ ταῦτα, i.¢., iv. I f.), as 
though the words were a rough pro- 
gramme of the whole book; nor, as 
other editors (e.g., Spitta) unconvincingly 
suggest, is ἃ εἰσὶν = “‘ what they mean,” 
epexegetic of, ἃ εἶδες, or εἶδες (cf. x. 7, 
xv. I) in a future perfect sense (Selwyn). 
The following chapters cannot be re- 
garded merely as interpretations of i. 
Io-18, and the juxtaposition of μέλλει 
γεν. (from LXX of Isa. xlviii. 6) fixes the 
temporal meaning of εἰσίν here, even 
although the other meaning occurs in a 
different context in ver. 20. Besides, 
i. 10-18 is out of all proportion to the 
other two divisions, to which indeed it 
forms a brief prelude. The real sense 
is that the contents of the vision (εἶδες, 
like βλέπεις in ver. τι, being proleptic) 
consist of what is and what is to be, 
these divisions of present and future 
underlying the whole subsequent Apo- 
calypse. The neut. plur. with a plural 
verb and a singular in the same sent- 
ence, indicates forcibly the  indiffer- 
ence of the author to the niceties of 
Hellenistic grammar. For the whole 
see Dan. ii. 29, 30, also Barn. i.: “ The 
Lord (δεσπότης) hath disclosed to us 
by the prophets things past and present, 
giving us also a taste of the firstfruits of 
the future”; v.: “We ought, there- 
fore, to be exceedingly thankful to the 
Lord for disclosing the past to us and 
making us wise in the present; yea as 
regards the future even we are not void 
of understanding”. Moral stimulus and 
discipline were the object of such visions : 
as Tertullian declares of the Mortanist 
seers: ‘‘uidunt uisiones et ponentes 
faciem deorsum etiam uoces audiunt 
manifestas tam salutares quam occultas ” 
(de exhort. cast. το). 

Ver. 20. pvor. (as in Dan. ii. 27, 
LXX ; see below on x. 7) = “the secret 
symbol”. These two symbols, drawn 
from the lore of contemporary apoca- 
lyptic, are chosen for explanation, partly 
as an obscure and important element in 


the foregoing vision which had to be set 
in a new light, partly because they atford 
a clue to ali that follows (especially the 
opening section, ii. 1, 5). The seven- 
branched lamp-stand was a familiar 
symbol, frequently carved on the lintel 
of a synagogue. Along with the silver 
trumpets and other spoils of the temple 
it now lay in the temple of Peace at 
Rome. The fanciful symbolism, by 
which the cressets shining on earth are 
represented —in another aspect — as 
heavenly bodies, corresponds to Paul’s 
fine paradox about the Christian life of 
the saints lying hidden with Christ in 
God; even unsatisfactory churches, like 
those at Sardis and Laodicea, are not 
yet cast away. Note also that the light 
and presence of God now shine in the 
Christian churches, while the ancestral] 
Jewish light is extinguished (4 Esd. x. 
22): ‘* The light of our lamp-stand is put 
out”). It is curious that in Assyrian 
representations the candelabrum is fre- 
quently indistinguishable from the sacred 
seven-branched tree crowned with a star 
(R. S. 488); Josephus expressly de- 
clares (Ant. 111. 6. 7, 7. 7) that the seven 
lamps on the stand signified the seven 
planets, and that the twelve loaves on 
the shew-bread table signified the signs 
of the zodiac (Bell. v. 5, 5), while Philo 
had already allegorised the lamp-stand 
(=seven planets) in quis haeres, ὃ xlv. 
This current association of the λύχνοι 
with the planets is bound up with the 
astral conception of the angels of the 
churches (ayy. = ‘“‘angels” as elsewhere 
in Apocalypse), who are the heavenly 
representatives and counterparts or pa- 
tron angels of the churches, each of the 
latter, like the elements (e.g., water 
xvi. 5, fire xiv. 18; see further in Bal- 
densperger, 106, and Gfrérer, i. 368 
f.), the wind (vii. 1), and the nether 
abyss (ix. 11), having its presiding 
heavenly spirit. The conception (E. 
F. i. 593, 594) reaches back to post- 
exilic speculation, in which Greece, 
Persia and Judza had each an influen- 
tial and responsible angelic prince (Dan. 
X. 13, 20-21, xii. 1), and especially to the 
Iranian notion of fravashis or semi- 
ideal prototypes of an earthly personality 


348 


i Similar 
explana- 


tions, xiii. at ἑπτὰ, ἑπτὰ ἐκκλησίαι εἰσί. 
II. 1. “Τῶι ἀγγέλῳ τῆς ἐν ᾿Εφέσῳ ἐκκλησίας γράψον. Τάδε λέγει 


18, xvii. 7, 
9, Mk. xiii. 
14, 1 Cor. 
XV. 51, 

Rom. xi. 25 (cf. 1 Cor. xiv. 1 f.). 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 


Ti, 


‘ol ἑπτὰ ἀστέρες ἄγγελοι τῶν ἑπτὰ ἐκκλησιῶν εἰσί καὶ at λυχνίαι 


1 The variant tw (AC, Pr., τω τῆς 36, cf. Ws., 64-65) for the τῆς (τω εν εκκλησια 
Εφεσου = S) of ΟΡ, Arm., And., Areth. is preferred by Lach., Tr., Naber, WH 
(136-137), Sx., Sw., and Hort (38-40): for χρυσων (ΟΡ, etc., Ti., WH, Bj., 
Bs.) Lach., Tr., Ws., Sw. (after AC) substitute χρυσεων (cf. Helbing, 84 f). 


(here, a community), associated with re- 
miniscences of the Babylonian idea that 
certain stars were assigned to certain 
lands, whose folk and fortunes were bound 
up with their heavenly representatives 
(cf. Rawlinson’s Cuneif. Inscript. West. 
Asia Minor, ii. 49, iil. 54, 59, etc.). 
Afterwards (cf. Tobit) individuals were 
assigned a guardian spirit. This belief 
(Gfrorer, i. 374 f.) passed into early Chris- 
tianity (Matt. xviii. ro, Acts xii. 15, 
where see note), but naturally it never 
flourished, owing to Christ’s direct and 
spiritual revelation of God’s fatherly 
providence. The association of stars 
and angels is one of the earliest de- 
velopments in Semitic folklore, and 
its poetic possibilities lent themselves 
effectively as here to further religious 
applications; e.g., Enoch (i. 18) had 
long ago represented seven stars, “like 
spirits,” in the place of fiery punishment 
for disobedience to God’s commands. 
As Dr. Kohler points out (EZ. F. i. 
582-97), the determining factors of 
Jewish angelology were the ideas of 
‘the celestial throne with its ministering 
angels, and the cosmos with its evil 
forces to be subdued by superior angelic 
forces,” which corresponds to the puni- 
tive and protective roles of angels in the 
Johannine Apocalypse. But in the latte: 
they are neither described at length nor 
exalted. They are simply commissioned 
by God to execute his orders or instruct 
the seer. The supreme concern of God 
is with the earth and man; angels are 
but the middle term of this relationship, 
at most the fellow-servants of the saints 
whose interests they promote (see below 
On xix. 9, 10, xxii. 8, 9). Christians, un- 
like the Iranians (e.g. Bund. xxx. 23, 
etc.), offer no praises to them; they re- 
serve their adoration for God and Christ. 
However graphic and weird, the delinea- 
tion of demons and angels in this book 
is not grotesque and crude in the sense 
that most early Jewish and Christian 
lescriptions may be said to deserve these 
epithets. Here the guardian spirit who 


is responsible for a church’s welfare, 
would, roughly speaking, be identified 
with itself; his oversight and its exist- 
ence being correlative terms. Hence 
there is a sense in which the allied 
conception of ayy. is true, namely, that 
the ayy. is the personified spirit or 
genius or heavenly counterpart of the 
church, the church being regarded as 
an ideal individual (so Andr., Areth., 
Wetst., Bleek, Liicke, Erbes, Beyschlag, 
Swete, etc.) who possesses a sort of 
Egyptian Ka or double. By itself, how- 
ever, this view lies open to the objection 
that it explains one symbol by another 
and hardly does justice to the naive 
poetry of the conception. The notion 
of guardian angels was widespread in 
the early church (Hermas, Justin, Clem. 
Alex., Origen, etc.), independently of this 
passage. Statius (Szlv. i. 241) says that 
Domitian “ posuit sua sidera” (ἰ.6., of 
his family) in the heaven, when he 
raised a temple to the Flavians—a con- 
temporary parallel upon a lower level of 
feeling, but indicating a similar view of 
the heavenly counterpart (cf. Ramsay, 
Seven Letters, 68 f.) The Apocalypse, 
though presupposing the exercise of dis- 
cipline and the practice of reading, 
prayer, and praise within the Christian 
communities, entirely ignores officials of 
any kind; and the following homilies are 
directly concerned with the churches 
(ii. 7, ἐκκλησίαις, not the angels), their 
different members (cf. ii. 24) and their 
respective situations. Hence the poetic 
idealism of the ἄγγελοι soon fades, when 
the writer’s practical sense is brought to 
bear. As the scene of revelation is év 
πνεύματι and its author the heavenly 
Christ, the writer is instructed to ad- 
dress not τοῖς ἁγίοις (¢.g., ἐν Ἐφέσῳ), 
but their patron spirit or guardian angel. 
The point of the address is that the 
revelation of Jesus is directly conveyed 
through the spoken and written words of 
the prophets, as the latter are controlled 
by his Spirit. 

CHAPTER II. 1-CuapTer III. 20. The 


ee ea 


i—2. 


© κρατῶν τοὺς ἑπτὰ ἀστέρας ἐν TH δεξιᾷ αὐτοῦ, ὁ * 


péow τῶν ἑπτὰ λυχνιῶν τῶν χρυσῶν" 


τὸν κόπον καὶ τὴν ὑπομονήν σου, καὶ ὅτι οὐ δύνῃ “ βαστάσαι κακούς, 
Nd. , , A > , 
Kat “ἐπείρασας τοὺς λέγοντας ἑαυτοὺς εἶναι ἀποστόλους ° 


ὀφρὺν βαστάσει), ‘* Thou canst not so much as tolerate”. 


“tested, put to the proof”. e Cf. oni. 6. 


seven open letters or pastorals (in the 
modern and ecclesiastical sense of the 
term) are appeals for vigour and vigil- 
ance which reflect a mind in which 
imaginative, even mystic fervour was 
accompanied by shrewd penetration into 
the existing state of morals and religion 
in the Asiatic communities. Their dis- 
orders and difficulties do not escape the 
notice of the prophet. He will neither 
spare nor despair of the churches. He 
speaks in the name of a Lord who knows 
not only who are his, but what they are, 
One who is keenly alive to their plight 
and struggles (οἶδα, ii. 1, etc.) alike 
against inward corruption and the ex- 
‘ternal pressure of the Empire, one to 
whom their obscure provincial conflict 
is a matter of infinite moment. 

ii. I-7, to Ephesus. 

Ver. 1. The political and commer- 
‘cial primacy of Ephesus, conjoined 
with its prestige as a centre for the 
Imperial cultus which flourished be- 
‘side the local cult of Diana, lent it 
cecumenical importance in the Eastern 
Empire. Christianity had for about 
half a century already made it a 
‘sphere and centre, and its position was 
enormously enhanced after the crisis of 
70. A.D. in Palestine, when Asia Minor 
became one of the foci of the new faith 
{cf. von Dobschiitz, pp. too f.). The 
‘description of the speaker is carried on 
from i. 12, 16, 20, with κρατῶν for 
«ἔχων (the church i is neither to be plucked 
nor to be dropped from his hand) and 
the addition of περιπατῶν to ἐν μέσῳ 
(activity and universal watchfulness, cf. 
Abbott, pp. 196 f.), touches which make 
the sketch more definite, but which are 
too slight to be pressed into any signifi- 
cance, unless one supposes a subtle 
general contrast between the ideal of the 
churches—“‘a star shining by its own 
inherent light ”—and their actual con- 
dition upon earth which, like the lamp, 
requires constant replenishing and care, 
if its light is not to flicker or fade. 

Ver. 2. οἶδα: nothing escapes his 
notice, neither the good (2-3, 6) nor the 
bad (4, 5) qualities. ἔργα = the general 
ourse and moral conduct of life, exem- 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ [LQANNOY 


349 


περιπατῶν ἐν a Lev. xxiv. 
4, XXVi. 12 
(LXX), 

b Not in ii. 
9, 13. 

c (Cf. Epict. 

καὶ οὐκ Diss. i. 3, 

2 οὐδεὶς 
5 σον τ. 
d 1 John iv. 1, cf. 2 Cor. xiii. 5: 


2. Οἶδα τὰ ὃ" ἔργα σου, καὶ 


plified more especially in its active and 
passive sides, as exertion and endurance, 
by κόπος and ὑπομονή, which are knit 
together by the final σου as epexegetic of 
ἔργα. The κόπος, or hard work, is 
further specified in the text of ver. 2 
(the church’s vigorous dealing with im- 
postors), while the ὑπομονή is developed 
in ver. 3. For a parallel, verbal rather 
than real, see 1 Thess. i. 3. Here duty 
follows privilege (ver. 1), and communion 
with Christ involves practical energy and 
enterprise on earth. The remarkable 
prominence of ἔργα in this book corre- 
sponds to its O.T. conception of the fear 
of God which, as a religious principle, 
manifests itself effectively in works. 
The phrase has nothing to do with the 
special sense in which Paul had em- 
ployed it during a bygone controversy. 
Works here are the result of an inner 
relation to God (xii. 11).—Patient endur- 
ance (2, 3, 7) wins everything and 
triumphs over opposition, as in the case 
of the Maccabean martyrs (4 Mace. i. 
11) who are lauded for their courage, 
καὶ τῇ ὑπομονῇ - - - νικήσαντες τὸν 
τύραννον τῇ ὑπομονῇ.--βαστάσαι, the 
weak are a burden to be borne (Gal. 
vi. 2): the false, an encumbrance to be 
thrown ofi. Patience towards the for- 
mer is a note of strength: towards the 
latter, it is a sign of weakness. The 
prophet is thoroughly in sympathy (cf. 
2 John to, 11) with the sharp scrutiny 
exercised at Ephesus over soi-disant 
missioners; he gladly recognises the 
moral vigour and shrewdness which 
made the local church impatient of 
itinerant evangelists whose character 
and methods would not stand scrutiny. 
Pretensions, greed and indolence were 
the chief sins of this class, but the 
prophet does not enter into details. He 
is content to welcome the fact that un- 
complaining endurance of wrong and 
hardship has not evaporated the power 
of detecting impostors and of evincing 
moral antipathy to them, upon the prin- 
ciple that ὑπομονή, as Clem. Alex. 
finely explained (Strom. ii. 18), is the 
knowledge of what is to be endured and 
of what is not. The literature of this 


359 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


i. 


f For these εἰσί, καὶ ‘edpes αὐτοὺς ψευδεῖς, 3. καὶ ὑπομονὴν ἔχεις, καὶ 


unedu- 
cated 
forms in 
“ES, (Bhs 
Moulton, 
1.52. 
g For 

phrase, cf. Matt. v. 23. 
Cf. Eph. iii. 17, v. 2, 1 Tim. i. 5. 


ἐβάστασας διὰ τὸ ὄνομά pou, καὶ οὐ * κεκοπίακες. 
Ξκατὰ σοῦ ὅτι τὴν "ἀγάπην σου τὴν πρώτην ἀφῆκας ! 


4. “ANN ἔχω. 
5. 


ἐμνημόνευε οὖν πόθεν πέπτωκες," καὶ μετανόησον Kal τὰ πρῶτα. 


hi Thess. iii. 12, iv.g, 2 Thess. i. 3; Clem. Rom. xxxiii. 1, xlix. 7. 
i See Acts xxvi. 20. 


1 For the perfective flexion (Helbing, 103-104) αφηκας (pyccAPQ, etc., Al. Lachm.,. 
Bs., Ws.) [Matt. xxiii. 23] some (Ti., Tr., WH, Bj., Sw.) substitute αφηκες ($Q*C). 

2 For the exwemtwxas of P, 1, etc., S., Andpal, vg., Vict., read either πέπτωκες (δῷ, 
Ti., WH, Bj., Sw.) or -as (ACQ, etc., Ande, Areth., Cyp., Pr., Al. Lachm., Tr., Ws.). 


period (1 John, Didaché, etc.) is full of 
directions upon the moral and religious 
tests which a community should apply to 
these itinerant evangelists and teachers 
called “apostles”. The popularity and 
spread of Christianity rendered precau- 
tions necessary on the part of the faith- 
ful against unscrupulous members of 
this order, which had already attracted 
men of quite inferior character as well 
as of heretical beliefs. The evil men 
here includes these pseudo-apostles as 
well as the Nikolaitan libertines of ver. 
6 (cf. 15) with whom perhaps the 
“apostles”? were in sympathy; ἐπείρ. 
and εὗρ. denote some definite and recent 
crisis, while puo. reflects the permanent 
obstacles of the local situation. This 
temper of the church is warmly com- 
mended by Ign. (ad Eph. ix.) at a later 
period; “1 have learned that certain 
folk passed through you with wicked 
doctrine (κακὴν διδαχήν). but you would 
not allow them to sow seed in you”. 
With equal loftiness and severity of tone, 
John like Ignatius might have added: 
τὰ δὲ ὀνόματα αὐτῶν, ὄντα ἄπιστα, οὐκ 
ἔδοξέν μοι ἐγγράψαι (Smyrn. v.). 

Ver. 3. The tenses as in ver. 2 de- 
note a general attitude still existing, the 
outcome of some special stage of perse- 
cution for the sake of the Christian name. 
κεκοπίακες, cf. κόπον (ver. 2), a slight 
play on words; ‘‘ nouilaborem tuum, nec 
tamen laboras, i.e., labore non frangeris” 
(Bengel). Tired in loyalty, not of it. 
The Ephesian church can bear anything 
except the presence of impostors in her 
membership. 

Ver. 4. Brotherly love, an early and 
authentic proof of the faith; as in ver. 
19, 2 John 5-6, 3 John 6, and the striking 
parallel of Matt. xxiv. 12 (see 10) where, 
as at Corinth (see also Did. xvi. 3) party- 
spirit and immorality threatened its ex- 
istence. Jealous regard for moral or 
doctrinal purity, and unwavering loyalty 
in trial, so far from necessarily sustain- 
ing the spirit of charity, may exist side by 
side, as here, with censoriousness, sus- 


picion, and quarrelling. Hence the neg- 
lect of brotherly love, which formed a 
cardinal fault in contemporary gnosticism: 
(t.e., I John ii. g; r Tim.i. 5 f.), may 
penetrate the very opposition to such 
error. During any prolonged strain 
put upon human nature, especially in a 
small society driven jealously to maintain. 
its purity, temper is prone to make in- 
roads on atiection and forbearance; it 
was inevitable also that opportunities. 
for this should be given in early Chris- 
tianity, where party-leaders tended to: 
exaggerate either the liberal or the puri- 
tan element in the gospel. When Ap- 
ollonius of Tyana visited Ephesus, one 
of the first topics he raised was the duty 
of unselfish charity (Vit. Apoll. iv. 3). 
The historical reference here is probably 
to the temporary decline of the Ephesian 
church after Paul’s departure (see Acts 
xx. 29 f., etc.) Its revival took place 
under the ministry of the Johannine 
circle, who—carrying on the spirit of 
Paulinism with independent vigour— 
made it the most prominent centre of 
Christianity in the East. With wv. 2-4, 
compare Pliny, H. N. ii. 18: ‘‘ deus est 
mortali iuuare mortalem, et haec ad aeter- 
nam gloriam uia”; also Pirke Aboth, ii. 
15, where R. Jehoshua, a contemporary 
Jewish sage, says: ‘‘an evil eye [1.6., envy, 
niggardliness], and the evil nature, and 
hatred of mankind put a man out of the 
world” (cf. τ John iii. 15). This em- 
phasis upon brotherly love 45 the 
dominant characteristic of the church 
and the supreme test of genuine faith, is 
early Christian, however, rather tham 
specifically Johannine (see the account of 
the young aristocratic martyr Vettius Epa- 
gathus, Ep. Lugd.). The purity which is 
not peaceable cannot be adequate to the 
demands of Jesus, and nowhere did this. 
need reinforcement more than in the 
townships of Asia Minor, where factious- 
ness and division constantly spoiled their 
guilds and mutual relations. 

Ver. 5. πόθεν, from what a height. 
Contrast Οἷς, ad Attic. iv. 17: “ ποῦ» 


3-—6. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


351 


ἔργα ' ποίησον εἰ δὲ μή, Epxopal “oor καὶ ᾿' κινήσω thy λυχνίαν kii. 16, iii. 3. 
Ε 


σου ἐκ τοῦ ' τόπου αὐτῆς, ἐαν μὴ μετανοήσῃς. 


recordor unde ceciderim, sed unde re- 
surrexerim”. To realise that a decline 
has taken place, or to admit a lapse, is 
the first step and stimulus to amendment 
(see the fine passage in Bunyan’s pre- 
face to Grace Abounding, and the 
“ Hymn of the Soul,” 44, 45, in Acts of 
Thomas). Once this is brought home to 
the mind (μνημόνευε, a prolonged effort), 
repentance quick and sharp (μετανόησον, 
aor.) will follow, issuing in a return to 
the first level of excellence (καὶ τὰ πρῶτα 
ἔργα ποίησον), i.¢., to the initial charity 
(2 John 6, 8; love shown in deeds). The 
way to regain this warmth of affection is 
neither by working up spasmodic emotion 
nor by theorising about it (Arist. Eth. 
Nic. ii. 4), but by doing its duties. (‘‘The 
two paracletes of man are repentance and 
good works,” Sanhed. 32). Itis taken for 
granted that man possesses the power of 
turning and returning; the relation of 
Christ's redeeming death to the forgive- 
ness of sins throughout the Christian life, 
although implied, is never explicitly 
argued (as in Hebrews) by this writer. 
The present (€px.) emphasises the 
nearness of the approach, while the 
future (ktv.) denotes a result to follow 
from it. σοι either a dat. incommodi or 
(more probably) a local dat. (rare in clas- 
sical literature, cf. Aesch. Pr. V. 360) 
with ‘‘the sense of motion to a place” 
(Simcox, Lang. N. T. 81), if not an in- 


correct reproduction of Heb. J? (as 


Matt. xxi. 5, Blass). Cf. fourn. Theol. 
St. iii. 516. κινήσω «.T.A., (“ efficiam 
ut ecclesia esse desinas,” Areth.) ; not 
degradation but destruction is the threat, 
brotherly love being the articulus stantis 
aut cadentis ecclesiae. So, ina remark- 
able parallel from Paul (Phil. ii. 14-16), 
quarrelsomeness forfeits the privileges of 
Christ’s care and service, since the func- 
tion of being φωστῆρες ἐν κόσμῳ, λόγον 
ζωῆς ἐπέχοντες depends upon concord 
and charity in the church (πάντα ποιεῖτε 
χωρὶς γογγυσμῶν καὶ διαλογισμῶν). A 
slackened senseof the obligation to mutual 
love formed the cardinal sin at Ephesus; 
to repent of this was the condition of 
continued existence as a church; utility 
or extinction is the alternative held out 
to her. The nature of the visitation is 
left unexplained; the threat is vague, 
but probably eschatological. The Apo- 
calypse, however, knows nothing of the 


x or 
6. ᾿Αλλὰ τοῦτο phrase 
see Vi. 14. 


Jewish idea that Israel’s repentance would 
bring the advent of messiah (cf. Schiirer’s 
Hist. 11. ii. 163, 164), as though the 
transgressions of the people hindered his 
appearance. 

Ver. 6. The message ends with a 
tardy echo of 2 b. The prophet admits 
that one redeeming feature in the church 
is the detestation of the N. Not all the 
spirit of animosity at Ephesus is amiss. 
When directed, as moral antipathy, 
against these detestable Nikolaitans (cor- 
responding to the Greek quality of 
μισοπονηρία), it is a healthy feature of 
their Christian consciousness. The 
Nikolaitans have been identified by 
patristic tradition, from Irenzus down- 
wards, with the followers of the proselyte 
Nikolaos (Acts vi. 5, where see note), who 
is alleged, especially by Tertullian and 
Epiphanius, to have lapsed into anti- 
nomian license, as the result of an over- 
strained asceticism, and to have given his 
name to a sect which practised religious 
sensuality in the days before Cerinthus. 
The tenets of the latter are in fact de- 
clared by Irenzeus to have been antici- 
pated by the Nicolaitans, who represented 
the spirit of libertinism which, like the 
opposite extreme of legalism at an 
earlier period, threatened the church’s 
moral health. But if the comment of 
Vict. were reliable, that the N. principle 
was merely ut delibatum exorcizaretur 
et manducari posset et ut quicumque 
fornicatus esset octauo die pacem ac- 
ciperet, the representation of John would 
become vigorously polemical rather than 
historically accurate. The tradition of 
the N.’s origin may of course be simply 
due to the play of later imagination upon 
the present narrative taken with the 
isolated reference to Nikolaos in Acts vi. 
6. On the other hand it was not in the 
interest of later tradition to propagate 
ideas derogatory to the character of an 
apostolic Christian; indeed, as early as 
Clem. Alex. (Stvom. ii. 20, iii. 4; cf. 
Constit. Ap. vi. 8), a disposition (shared 
by Vict.) to clear his character is evident. 
Whatever was the precise relation of the 
sect to Nikolaos, whether some tenet of 
his was exploited immorally or whether 
he was himself a dangerously lax teacher, 
there is no reason to doubt the original 
connexion of the party with him. Its 
accommodating principles are luminously 
indicated by the comment of Hippolytus 


aoe 


m Ps. 
CXXxix. 


ATIOKAAY¥VIZ IQANNOY 


ἔχεις, ὅτι “poets τὰ ἔργα τῶν Νικολαϊτῶν, " ἃ κἀγὼ μισῶ. 


re 


η. 18.. 


lol -“Β , - 
21, cf.on ἔχων οὖς ἀκουσάτω τί τὸ Πνεῦμα λέγει ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις - Τῷ 


Rom. Xxii. 


9. 
n Cf. Polyk. Phil. ii. 2. 


(ἐδίδασκεν ἀδιαφορίαν βίου) and the 
phrase attributed to him by Clem. Alex. 
(παραχρήσασθαι τῇ σαρκὶ Set), a hint 
which is confirmed, if the Nikolaitans 
here and in ver. 15 are identified with 
the Balaamites (viko-Aaos, in popular 
etymology, a rough Greek equivalent for 
DY ys, perdidit uel absorpsit popu- 
lum). This symbolic interpretation has 
prevailed from the beginning of the 
eighteenth century (so Ewald, Hengsten- 
berg, Diist., Schiirer, Julicher, Bousset). 
The original party-name was probably 
interpreted by opponents in this deroga- 
tory sense. It was thus turned into a 
covert censure upon men who were 
either positively immoral or liberally 
indifferent to scruples (on food, clubs, 
marriage, and the like) which this puri- 
tan prophet regarded as vital to the pre- 
servation of genuine Christianity in a 
pagan city. A contemporary parallel of 
moral laxity is quoted by Derenbourg, 
Hist. de la Palestine (1867), p. 363. If 
Nikolaos was really an ascetic himself, 
the abuse of his principles is quite in- 
telligible, as well as their popularity with 
people of inferior character. Pushed to 
an extreme, asceticism confines ethical 
perfection to the spirit. As the flesh 
has no part in the divine life, it may 
be regarded either as a foe to be con- 
stantly thwarted or as something morally 
indifferent. In the latter case, the prac- 
tical inference of sensual indulgence is 
obvious, the argument being that the 
lofty spirit cannot be soiled by such in- 
dulgence any more than the sun is 
polluted by shining on a dunghill. 

Ver. 7. Astringent demand for atten- 
tion (πίστις, ὦτα ψυχῆς: Clem. Alex.) 
to the utterances of prophets who were 
inspired by the Spirit (of prophecy, cf. 
on xix. 10). These as usual are ejacula- 
tory, positive and brief—ékkA. scattered 
Jocal communities, and not a Catholic 
organisation, being the conception of the 
Apocalypse, it is for use in their public 
worship that this book is written (i. 3). 
It is a subordinate and literary question 
whether the seer means in such phrases 
as this to designate himself (Weinel, 84 f.) 
liturgically as the speaker, or whether 
(as the synoptic parallels suggest) they 
form an integral part of the whole men- 
age. In any case the prophet represents 


o MK. iv.23, etc., fr. Ezek. iii. 27. 


himself simply as the medium for receiv- 
ing and recording (cf. i. 1g) these oracles 
of the Spirit (cf. xiv. 13, xix. 9, xx. 17). 
Unlike other writers suchas Paul and 
the authors of Hebrew and 1 John, he 
occupies a passive rdéle, throwing his 
personal rebuke and counsels into the 
form Thus saith the Spirit: but this 
really denotes the confidence felt by the 
prophet in his own inspiration and au- 
thority. The Spirit here, though less 
definitely than in Hermas, is identified 
with Jesus speaking through his prophets : 
it represents sudden counsels and semi- 
oracular utterances (cf. on i. 10), not a 
continuous power in the normal moral 
life of the saints in general. The seven 
promises denote security of immortal life 
(positively as here and ver. 28 or negatively 
as ver. II), privilege (personal, ver. 17, or 
official, ver. 27), honour (iii. 5, 21), or 
increased intimacy (iii. 12). As usual, 
(cf. x Cor. ii. οἵ), the higher Christian 
γνῶσις is connected with eschatology. 

Observe the singling out for encourage- 
ment and praise of each soldier in the 
host of the loyal. The effect resembles 
that produced by Pericles in his panegyric 
over the Athenians who had fallen in the 
Peloponnesian war: ‘together they gave 
up their lives, yet individually they won 
this deathless praise” (Thuc. ii. 43, 2). 
νικῶν (a quasi-perfect), in Herm. Mand. 
xii. 2,4 £, 5. 2, 4, 6.2, 4 (over'sin and 
devil), might have its usual Johannine 
sense, the struggle being obedience in face 
of the seductions and hardships which 
beset people aiming to keep the divine 
commandments (cf. on John xvi. 33). 
For a special application of the term, see 
xv. 2. But behind the general usage lies 
the combination of ‘‘to be pure or just” 
and ‘‘to conquer or triumph” in the 
Hebrew sédek andthe Syriac zedha. Fur- 
thermore, νικῶν throughout is equivalent 
to the Egyptian eschatological term ‘ vic- 
torious,’ applied to those who passed 
successfully through life’s temptations 
and the judgment after death. Its 
generic sense is illustrated by 4 Esd. vii. 
[128]: “here is the intent of the battle 
to be fought by man born upon earth: if 
he be overcome, he shall suffer as thou 
hast said; but if he conquer, he shall re- 
ceive the thing of which I speak” (i.e., 
paradise and its glories). The Essenes 


7—8. 


AITOKAAY¥IZ IQANNOY 


353 


PyikvTt δώσω αὐτῷ "φαγεῖν ἐκ τοῦ ξύλου τῆς ζωῆς, ὅ ἐστιν ἐν» Ἐπ. 1,2. 


τῷ " παραδείσῳ τοῦ θεοῦ. 


“8. Καὶ τῷ ἀγγέλῳ tis! ἐν Σμύρνῃ ἐκκλησίας γράψον: Τάδε 


I xxii. 2, 14, 19. 


q Redun- 
dant, 
Moult. 

i. 85, 
Win. § 22, 
a 


s Ezek. xxxi. 8, 2 Cor. xii. 4, Lk. xxiii. 43; Bey? 148. 


1For τῆς SCPQ (Ti., Al. Ws., Bs., Bj.) Lach., WH, Sw. prefer τω (Asafa: 
I, 18): Ζμυρνη (N, am., fuld., S., Ti.), an orthography which ceases on coins 
towards end of Trajan’s reign (according to Waddington, Fastes des provinces 


asiatiques, i. 158). 


according to Josephus (Ant. xviii. 1, 5), 
held the soul was immortal, περιμάχητον 
ἡγούμενοι τοῦ δικαίου τὴν πρόσοδον--- 
eternal life the reward of an untiring, un- 
soiled fight against evil. The imagery of 
the metaphor is drawn from Jewish es- 
chatology which anticipated the reversal 
of the doom incurred in Eden; cf. Test. 
Levi, 18, καὶ δώσει τοῖς ἁγίοις φαγεῖν 
ἐκ τοῦ ξύλου τῆς ζωῆς, also En. xxiv. 
ΠΗ αν ΧΙ 15:5, etc., ‘and (for 
Egyptian ideas) below on iii. 21. The 
garden-park of God (w. = a garden with 
fruit-trees, Wilcken’s Griech.» Ostraka, i. 
157) is one of the intermediate abodes, 
possibly (as in Slav. En. viii. 1, and Paul) 
the third heaven where the favoured saints 
live after death in seclusion and bliss, 
So Iren. v. 5. 1 (abode of translated) and 
v. 36, 1-2, where heaven is for the Chris- 
tians of the hundredfold fruit, paradise 
for the sixty-fold, and the heavenly city 
for the thirty-fold (a very ancient Chris- 
tian tradition). The tree of life blooms 
in most of the apocalypses (cf. on xxii. 2). 
Philo had already allegorised it into 
θεοσέβεια ὁ τῆς τελείας ἀρετῆς χαρακτήρ. 
But the allusion corresponds to the gene- 
tal eschatological principle (borrowed 
from Babylonia, where cosmological 
myths passed into eschatological) that 
the end was to be a transcendently fine 
renovation of the original state (Barn. vi. 
8). pov a deliberate addition to the O.T. 
phrase ; Christ’s relation to God guaran- 
tees his promise of such a privilege (iii. 
12). God’s gift (Rom. vi. 23) is Christ’s 
gift. He is no fair promiser like Anti- 
gonus II., whom men dubbed δώσων for 
his large and unfulfilled undertakings 
(Plut. Coriol. xi.). 

Vv. 8-11. The message (shortest of 
the seven) to the Christians in Smyrna, 
“one of the first stars in the brilliant belt 
of the cities of Asia Minor” (Mommsen), 
a wealthy and privileged seaport, and 
like Sardis a constant rival of Ephesus 
for the title of primacy which properly 
belonged to Pergamos, the real capital of 
the province. It is probably owing to 


the petty jealousies of these urban com- 
munities that the prophet refrains from 
speaking of one to the other (as Paul did, 
with his churches), by way of example. 
Ver. 8. The title from i. 17-18, 
with special reference to ver. 10 and 
its situation, also to the promise of ver. 
11. The Smyrniote Christians, in peril 
of death, are addressed and encouraged 
by One who himself has died—and risen 
to life. He is familiar [ver. 9] with the 
rough brake and briars through which faith 
must struggle to win its crown, and this 
familiarity is as usual put forward as the 
first element of encouragement. The 
other notes of help are (i.) the unap- 
proachable wealth of a devoted life, (ii.) 
the justice of their claim in spite of their 
opponents’ prestige and pretensions, (iii.) 
the providential limit assigned to their 
trial, and (iv.) itsample reward, besides the 
fact that Christ does not conceal from 
them the worst.—mrwx. Contrast R. 
Jochanan’s aphorism: ‘* Whosoever ful- 
fils the Torah in poverty will at length 
fulfil it in wealth; and whosoever neg- 
lects the Torah in wealth, will at length 
neglect it in poverty” (Pirke Aboth, iv. 
13). The subsequent allusion to Jews 
acquires fresh point from a comparison 
with (Chagigah, gb) another contemporary 
tabbi’s comment on Isa. xlviii. 10: ‘this 
means that the Holy One sought for all 
good qualities to give to Israel, and 
found only poverty”.—lov8. Does the 
prophet resent (see on this, von Dobs- 
chiitz, Texte u. Unters. xi. I. 35 f.) the 
Jewish claim to the title of God’s people, 
declaring in so many words (as Matt, xxi. 
43), that Judaism, so far as it is genuine, 
is now inside the church, and that the 
Jewish nation has forfeited its privilege 
and is now a pseudo-church (Harnack, 
H. D.i. 177-179)? If the passage does 
not breathe this common antipathy, the 
calumnies may be supposed to have taken 
the form of taunts upon the Christian de- 
lusion of believing that a Palestinian 
peasant and criminal was messiah, or of 
slanders upon Christian morals and mo- 


354 


ATIOKAAY¥IZ TQANNOY 


Il. 


t Cf. χιμ λέγει 6 πρῶτος καὶ ὁ ἔσχατος, ὃς ἐγένετο νεκρὸς καὶ “ἔζησεν 9. 


u Vernace 


, Ἀ 
lar geni- Οἶδα “cou τὴν θλίψιν καὶ τὴν ἡ" πτωχείαν - ἀλλὰ ” πλούσιος εἶ: καὶ 


tive (asin 
ii. ao iii. 
1, 8, 15), 
cf. Ab- 
bott, 
Diat. 
2781. 
Result of 
θλῖψις (Heb. x. 33-34)? 
iv. 21. x Cf. 1 Pet. iii. 16, iv. 4. 
(Blass, § 72, 2). a iii. 9, 2 Cor. xi. 14-15. 


πάσχειν. 


< 


lal Ἀ 
τὴν βλασφημίαν 7 ἐκ τῶν λεγόντων “᾿Ιουδαίους εἶναι ἑαυτούς, καὶ 
οὐκ εἰσὶν, ἀλλὰ συναγωγὴ "τοῦ Σατανᾶ. vo. Μηδὲν; φοβοῦ ἃ μέλλεις 


ἰδοὺ μέλλει βάλλειν ὁ διάβολος ἢ" ἐξ ὑμῶν εἰς φυλακὴν 


w 2 Cor. vi. 10, viii. 9, Jas. ii. 5, cf. Ps. xxxiv. 10-11, and espec. Tobit 
y Jobn iii. 25. 


z Constt. iii. 9, Rom. ii. 19, Lk. xx. 20 
b 2 John 4, partitive by harsh Hellenistic usage. 


1 For μηδεν (NP, etc., vg., Syr., Aeth., Andacbav, Areth., Cypr., Pr., Ti., Sx., Bs.) 
Lach., Al., Diist., Tr., WH, Ws., Bj., Sw. read the easier and less probable pr 


(ACQ, 8, 38, 49, Arm, Andpal), 


tives (reff.), or of malicious, anonymous 
accusations laid before the Roman au- 
thorities with reference to revolutionary 
designs on the part ofthe churches. ‘‘ Les 
Orientaux prennent d’ordinaire la religion 
comme un prétexte de taquineries ” (Re- 
nan). Judaism was strong at Smyrna, and 
its hostility to the Christians (see Otto’s 
notes on Just. Dial. xvi. 11, xxxv., etc.) 
would not be lessened by the accession of 
converts from the old faith to the new 
(ign. ad Smyrn. i. 2, describes the saints 
and faithful folk of Christ etre ἐν Ιουδαίοις 
εἴτε ἐν ἔθνεσιν) ; the reasons for such 
social animosity and interference are 
analysed in Jowett’s note on 1 Th. iii. 
13, in E. G. Hardy’s Christtanity and 
the Roman Government, pp. 45-53, and in 
Ramsay’s Seven Letters, 272 f. At the 
martyrdom of Polykarp in Smyrna, some 
years after the Apocalypse was written 
(as later still at the death of Pionius, 250 
A.D.) the Jews made themselves conspic- 
uous by denouncing him with the pagan 
mob before the Asiarch (ἀκατασχέτῳ 
θυμῷ καὶ μεγάλῃ φωνῇ), eagerly assisting 
to heap faggots on his pile (προθύμως, ὡς 
ἔθος avrois), and helping to prevent the 
Christians from obtaining the martyr’s 
body ἀξία pasate Kal ἐνισχυόντων 
τῶν ᾿Ιουδαίων : Mart. Polyk. xii., xvii.). 
The name of ‘‘ Jew,” ancient and honour- 
able, is claimed (καὶ οὐκ εἰσί) for believers 
in Jesus the messiah, who constitute the 
real people of God with a legitimate 
claim to the privileges and titles of the 
O.T. community. ‘‘ Now by our faith we 
have become more than those who 
seemed to have God” (2 Clem. ii. 3).— 
συν. oat. a bitter retort to the contem- 
porary claims of Judaism with its o. τοῦ 
κυρίου (cf, Num. xvi. 3, xx. 4, Ps. Sol. 
xvii. 18, o. ὁσίων). The allusion here is 
to Jewish, in ver. 13 (throne of S.) to 
pagan, and in ver. 24 (depths of S.) to 
heretical, antagonism. 


Ver. 10. μη. φοβοῦ, κιτιλ. ‘Thou 
orderest us to endure, not to love, trials. 
A man may love to endure, but he does 
not love what he endures” (Aug. Conf. 
x. 28). Ill-treatment, as well as misrepre- 
sentation, is traced back to a diabolic 
source, in the common early Christian 
manner (Weinel, 13 ἢ). The Imperial 
authorities (διάβολος as in 1 Peter v. 8), 
although often instigated by the Jews, 
had the sole power of inflicting imprison- 
ment, in this case for a refusal to worship 
the emperor’s image; the prophet here 
predicts an imminent persecution of this 
kind (compare Acts ix. 16, and above 
Introd. § 6) lasting for a short and limited 
time (δέκα np. seereff., originally due to the 
rough Semitic division of a month into 
decades). The local intensity of feeling 
upon the Imperial cultus may be gathered 
from the fact that in 23 a.p. Smyrna had 
secured from Tiberius and the senate, after 
keen competition, the coveted distinction 
of possessing the second temple decreed 
by the province to the Imperial cultus, 
Hence the struggle anticipated here is 
desperate (ἄχ. 6.); martyrdom is no 
remote contingency. Compare Ep. 
Lugd., where the martyr-crisis is taken 
as an anticipation of the final persecution 
(cf. Apoc. 111. 10, xiii. 7-15): ‘* with all his 
might the adversary assailed us, giving us 
a hint of what his unbridled advent would 
be like at the end”; the martyrs ‘“ en- 
dured nobly all the assaults heaped on 
them by the mob. They were shouted 
at, struck, haled about, robbed, stoned, 
imprisoned ; in fact they suffered all that 
an infuriated mob likes to inflict on 
enemies and opponents.”’—Then follows 
a commandment with promise: γίνου 
(not ἴσθι), “ show thyself” throughout all 
degrees of trial and inany emergency. It 
is more than doubtful if this is a subtle 
local allusion to the loyalty and local 
patriotism upon which Sardis prided her- 


9—I3- 


iva πειρασθῆτε - καὶ ἕξετε θλίψιν ἡμερῶν ° δέκα. 
ἃ ἄχρι θανάτου, καὶ δώσω σοι τὸν " στέφανον τῆς ᾿ζωῆς. 
ἔχων οὖς ἀκουσάτω τί τὸ Πνεῦμα λέγει ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις Ὁ νικῶν οὐ 
μὴ ἀδικηθῇ ἐκ τοῦ ὃ θανάτου τοῦ © δευτέρου. 

“12. Καὶ τῷ ἀγγέλῳ τῆς ἐν Περγάμῳ ἐκκλησίας γράψον. Τάδε 
λέγει "ὁ ἔχων τὴν ῥομφαίαν τὴν δίστομον τὴν ὀξεῖαν 13. Οἶδα 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


553 


γίνου πιστὸς © Gen. xxiv. 

= 555 Num, 

ΕἸ, Ὁ. xi 19, 
Dan. i. 12, 
14. 

d xii. 11, 
Acts xxii. 
4, Phil. ii. 
8, Sib. Or 
ii.47, Ign., 
Polyk. ii. 


A“ a“ ῳ ε “A “- Ν “Ἔν. «Κ᾿ 3. 
ποῦ κατοικεῖς, ὅπου ὁ θρόνος τοῦ Σατανᾶ, καὶ κρατεῖς TO ὄνομά μου, 6; Pet. ν. 


ἮΤΟ f Gen. epexeg. 
= Sir. xxi. 3. The spiritual jus gladit. 


self and which she had urged as her plea 
to Tiberius (Tacit. Ann. iv. 56). On the 
honours subsequently paid to martyrs in 
Smyrna, cf. Mart. Polyk. xvii. τοῦτον μὲν 
yap ὑιὸν ὄντα τοῦ θεοῦ προσκυνοῦμεν, 
«τοὺς δὲ μάρτυρας ὡς μαθητὰς καὶ μιμητὰς 
τοῦ κυρίου ἀγαπῶμεν (also Euseb. H. Ε. 
iv. 15. 46, 47), with the contemporary cry 
of 4 Esd. viii. 27: ‘‘Look not at the 
deeds of the impious but at those who 
have kept Thy covenants amid affliction” 
(1.6., the martyrs), also the subsequent 
Christian honour paid by Hermas (Vis. 
iii. 1, 2), who reserves the right hand of 
God for the martyrs who have “suffered 
for the sake of the Name,” enduring 
‘stripes, imprisonments, great afflictions, 
crosses, wild beasts”. For καὶ with fut. 
after imperative, see Eph. v. 14, James iv. 
.--στέφ. . Life, the reward assigned 
in ver. 7 to the triumph of faith is here 
bestowed upon the loyalty of faith. To 
hold one’s ground is, under certain cir- 
cumstances, as trying and creditable as it 
is under others to win positive successes. 
The metaphor of στέφ. with its royal, 
sacerdotal, and festal (Cant. iii. τι, Isa. 
xxviii. 1, Herm. Sim. viii. 2) associations, 
would call up civic and athletic honours 
to the local Christians, the latter owing 
to the famous games at Smyrna, the 
former from the fact that or. frequently 
occurs also in inscriptions as = public hon- 
our for distinguished service (paid, ¢.g., to 
Demosthenes and Zeno), whilst the yearly 
appointment of a priest at Eumeneia to 
the temple of Zeno was termed παράληψις 
Tov στέφανου (C. B. P. ii. 358). Com- 
pare, with the ἄξιοι of iii. 4, the sentence 
in Ep. Lugd. upon the martyrs: ἐχρῆν 
γοῦν τοὺς γενναίους ἀθλητὰς, ποικίλον 
ὑπομείναντας ἀγῶνα καὶ μεγάλως νικήσαν- 
τας, ἀπολαβεῖν τὸν μέγαν τῆς ἀφθ- 
αρσίας στέφανον, and the Greek phrase 
for noble deeds, ἄξια στεφάνων (Plut. 
Pericl. 28). 

Ver. II. ov μὴ (emphatic): no true 
Christian, much less one who dies a 


g See on xx. 6, 14. 
i Cf. on ver. 10, and iii. 8. 


4, 2 Tim, 
4 ; iv. 8, Jas. 
h xix. 15, Heb. iv. 12, En. lxii. 2; its stroke 


martyr’s death, need fear anything beyond 
the pang of the first death. The second 
death of condemnation in the lake of fire 
leaves the faithful scatheless, no matter 
how others may suffer from the terrors 
(cf. on iii. 12) which haunted the ancient 
outlook (especially the Egyptian) upon 
the dark interval between death and 
heaven. Cf. thesketch of Ani, seated on 
his throne and robed in white, holding 
sceptre and staff, and crying: “1 am not 
held to be a person of no account, and 
violence shall not bedone me. I am thy 
son, O Great One, and I have seen the 
hidden things that belong tothee. I am 
crowned king of the gods, and shall not 
die a second time in the underworld” 
(Ε. B. D. 99). Ifa Christian keep him- 
self loyal till death, the prophet here 
guarantees that Christ will keep him safe 
after death. After the promise of ver. 10 
however, this sounds like an anticlimax. 
The general tenor of the message indi- 
cates that John was rather more cordial 
and sympathetic to the Smyrniote church 
than to the Ephesian. 

Vv. 12-17. The message to Pergamos, 
the Benares or Lourdes of the province. 

Ver. 12. The title is apt in view of 
ver. 16. 

Ver. 13. Two features in the local 
situation menaced Christianity. Perga- 
mos, besides forming a legal centre for 
the district (ad eam conueniunt Thyatireni 
aliaeque inhonorae ciuitates, Plin. v. 33), 
was an old centre of emperor-worship in 
Asia Minor; in 29 B.c. a temple had been 
erected to the divine Augustus and the 
goddess Roma, and a special priesthood 
had been formed (ὑμνῳδοὶ θεοῦ Σεβαστοῦ 
καὶ θεᾶς Ῥώμης). Another feature, 
shocking to early Christian feeling, was 
the local cult of Aesculapius (cf. Zahn, 
§ 73, note 2), whose favourite symbol (e.¢., 
on coins) was a serpent (‘‘the god of Per- 
gamos, Mart. ix. 17); so Pausan. Cor. 27, 
(iii. 402), κάθηται δὲ ἐπὶ θρόνου βακτη- 
ρίαν κρατῶν, τὴν δὲ ἑτέραν τῶν χειρῶν 


356 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


The 


kx Tim. v. καὶ οὐκ ἠρνήσω τὴν * πίστιν | pou καὶ ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις ᾿Αντίπας 1 6 


1 xiv. 12: 
“in me 


, μάρτυς μου, 6 ἢ πιστός pou, ὃς ἀπεκτάνθη 1a) ὑμῖν, ὅπου ὁ σατανᾶς 


m Christ's κατοικεῖ. 14. ᾿Αλλ᾽ ἔχω κατὰ σοῦ ὀλίγα. ἔχεις ἐκεῖ κρατοῦντας τὴν 


own title 


(. 5, ii. διδαχὴν Βαλαάμ, ὃς ἐδίδασκεν "TH Βαλὰκ °Badety σκάνδαλον 


14). 
n Heb. dat. 


(Job xxi. 22 ὶς 1) ; correct constr.in ver.20. o Peculiar to Apocalypse; for τίθεναι or ποιεῖν. 


1 As an alternative to taking Avrumas as indeclinable, WH (after Lachm.) suggest 
the genit. Avrua (final C taken up from following O); so Nestle, Zahn, Schmiedel, 
Bj., Sw. With ev ats or ats (before Avtimas, so Ws., Bs.), supply either exstitit 


(Haym) or occisus est (Quaestt., 102, 2950). 


The avreimas of 5. might suggest a 


significant appellation rather than any personal noun (Gwynn). 


ὑπὲρ κεφαλῆς ἔχει τοῦ δράκοντος. In 
addition to these fashionable cults, a 
magnificent throne-like altar to Zeus 
Soter towered on the Acropolis (Paus. 11. 
73, 75, ili. 556, 557) commemorating the 
defeat of the barbarian Gauls by Attalus 
two centuries earlier, and decorated by a 
famous frieze of the gods warring against 
the giants (the latter, a brood of vigorous 
opponents, having often human bodies 
and serpentine tails, cf. below, ix. 19). 
No wonder Pergamos was called ‘‘a 
throne of Satan” by early Christians 
who revolted against the splendid and 
insidious paganism of a place where 
politics and religion were firm allies. 
Least of all at this cathedral centre of 
the Imperial cultus could dissent be 
tolerated. The Asiarch, e.g., who con- 
demns Polykarp is the local high priest 
of the altar, and the animus against 
Cesar-adoration which pervades the 
Apocalypse easily accounts for the last 
phrase 6 θ. τ. o., particularly as the 
symbol of the serpent in the Aesculapius 
cult would come vividly home to pious 
Jewish Christians in the church, as a 
reminder of Satan (¢.g., xii. 9 and passim). 
The priesthood of this cult, ‘‘a vast col- 
lege, believed to be in possession of cer- 
tain precious medical secrets,” came 
“nearest, perhaps, of all the institutions 
of the pagan world, to the Christian 
priesthood,” its rites being “ administered 
in a full conviction of the religiousness, 
the refined and sacred happiness, of a 
life spent in the relieving of pain” (Pater, 
Marius the Epicurean, i. 30; see Use- 
ner’s Gétternamen, 1896, pp. 147 f., 350, 
and Dill’s Roman Soc. from Nero to M. 
Aur. 459 f.). κρατεῖς, «.T.A., ‘‘ And the 
magistrate pressed him hard, saying, 
‘Swear the oath [by the genius of 
Czesar] and I will release thee; curse the 
Christ.’ But Polykarp replied, ‘ For 
eighty-six years I have served him, and 
he has never injured me. How then can 


I blaspheme my King, who has saved 
me?’” (Mart. Polyc. ix., Jewish analogies 
in 2 Mace. viii. 4, Ass. Mos. viii. etc.). 
Some definite outburst of persecution 
at Pergamos is in the writer’s mind 
(ἠρνήσω). To disown or abjure faith in 
Jesus, saying Κύριος Καῖσαρ, implies 
here as in the gospels the moral fault of 
cowardice, elsewhere (e.g. 1 John, Jud. 
4, 2 Peter ii. 1) erroneous doctrine. The 
circumstances and surroundings of the 
local church are taken into account, as 
usual, in the prophet’s estimate; they 
either claim some allowance to be made, 
or reflect additional credit and lustre on 
the particular community. 6 μάρτυς, 
«.7.A. He is faithful who retains his 
faith. Antipas (-- Ἀντίπατρος, Jos. Ant. 
xiv. I, 3; the name occurs in a third 
century inscription of Pergamos, Deissm. 
187), is mentioned by Tertullian (adv. 
Gnost. scorp. 12); otherwise he is un- 
known. His Acts appear to have been 
read by Andreas and Arethas, and, ac- 
cording to Simon Metaphrastes, he was 
an old, intrepid bishop of Pergamos 
whose prestige drew upon him the honour 
of being burned to death in a brazen 
bull during Domitian’s reign. The sober 
truth is probably that he formed the first 
prominent victim in the local church, 
possibly in Asia Minor, to the demands. 
of the Imperial cultus. Carpus, Papylus, 
and Agathoniké, the other martyrs of 
Pergamos named by Eusebius (H. E., iv. 
15, 48), died at a later period. On the 
whole verse see Ep. Lugd., ‘‘then did 
the holy martyrs endure indescribable 
torture, Satan eagerly striving to make 
them utter τὶ τῶν βλασφήμων". The 
textual variants arose froma failure to 
to see that Ἀντίπας (or -a) was a genitive 
and that μάρτυς was in characteristic 
irregular apposition to it. The name is 
neither a personification nor typical. 
Ver. 14. ὀλίγα, the errorists are 8. 
mere minority; they do not represent or 


----τῦ. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ΙΩΏΑΝΝΟΥ 


357 


ἐνώπιον τῶν υἱῶν Ἰσραήλ, ἢ φαγεῖν εἰδωλόθυτα καὶ “ πορνεῦσαι. Ρ τ Cor. 


15. οὕτως ἔχεις καὶ σὺ κρατοῦντας τὴν διδαχὴν τῶν Νικολαϊτῶν 
, > x ries , ; , \ q Xiv. 
16. Μετανόησον: εἰ δὲ μή, “ἔρχομαί σοι ταχύ Kal xvii. 1-2, 


ε , 1 
ομοιως. 


viii. 7-13 
X. 20-30. 
xiv. 8, 


4-5, XViil- 


319- T il. 5, iii. 3 


1Al., Diist., Lachm., WH, Sw. (after ACQ, Arm.) om. των before Nux. 


affect the main body of the church, whose 
fault is not sympathy but indifference. 
This carelessness arose probably from 
contempt or fear rather than through ig- 
norance.—éket (in the midst of loyalty 
and martyrdom). «pat. (not τὸ ὄνομά 
pov, but) lax principles worthy of a 
Balaam, the note of a pupil of Balaam 
being (according to Pirke Aboth, v. 19), 
an evil eye, a proud spirit, and a sensual 
soul. Contemporary opponents of Gnostic 
tendencies evidently found it an effective 
weapon to employ O.T. analogies or iden- 
tifications such as this or the similar ones 
in 2 Tim. iii. 8, Jud.tz. In the Hexateuch 
(JE=Num. xxv. 1-5, P= Num. xxv. 6-18, 
xxxi. 8-16, Josh. xiii. 22) Balaam is repre- 
sented as a magician who prompts the 
Moabite women to seduce the Israelites 
into foreign worship and its attendant 
sensualism ; but in the subsequent Jewish 
Midrash (followed here) his advice is 
given to Balak (Joseph. Ant. iv. 6, 6; cf. 
iv. 6, rr for Zimri, and Philo’s Vzt. Mos. 
i. 48-55), and the sorcerer comes to be 
regarded as the prototype of all corrupt 
teachers and magicians (for this sombre 
reputation, see E.F. ii. 467), as of this 
party at Pergamos who held—to John’s 
indignation—that it was legitimate for a 
Christian to buy food in the open market, 
which had already been consecrated to 
an idol. This problem, which had oc- 
curred years before in a sharp form at 
Corinth, was certain to cause embarrass- 
ment and trouble ina city like Pergamos, 
or indeed in any pagan town. where en- 
_tertainments had a tendency towards 
obscenity. It is a curious instance of 
how at certain periods a scruple may 
assume the rank of a principle, and of 
how the ethical inexpediency of some 
practices lies in their associations rather 
than in their essential elements. Such 
questions of religious conscience in 
the East were frequently connected with 
food; for the association of the latter 
with sexual vice, see the notes on Acts 
xv. 20 (also 1 Cor, x. 4, 8, in its con- 
text). The literal sense is preferable, 
although the usage of the Apocalypse 
makes the metaphorical sense of πορν- 
eossible, as a general description of 


MOP. Vv. 


pagan religions viewed under the aspect 
of unfaithfulness to the true God (οὔ. 
John viii. 41, Philo de migr. Abr. § 12) 

For the connexion between certain forms 
of popular religion in Phrygia and pros- 
titution, see C.B.P.,i.94f. Such burning, 
questions arose from the nature of the 
early Christian society, which never as-: 
pired to form a ghetto, and consequently, 
in a pagan township, had to face many 
nice problems with regard to the pru- 
dence and limits of conformity or the 
need of nonconformity (cf. 2 Cor. vi. 16, 
17). In social and trading pursuits the 
individual Christian met and mingled 
with fellow-citizens outside his own re- 
ligious circle, and these relationships 
started serious points of ethical principle 
(Dobschitz, 26 f., 188 f.). The line was 
drawn, but not always at the same place; 
and naturally laxity lay on the borders of 
enlightenment. 

Ver. 15. οὕτως «.t-A. Are the N. put 
parallel to, or identified with, the Balaa- 
mites ? The latter becomes more probable 
when the symbolical sense of N. and B. 
(see above, on ver. 6, and Kalisch’s Bible 
Studies, i. 23) is adopted. In this event 
a single class of errorists is in view ; they 
are instigating and seducing the local 
Christians much as Balaam managed (by 
means of Balak, in rabbinic tradition, 
cf. the slight play on βαλεῖν) to get the 
Israelites enticed to ruin (Sanh. 105 a). 
Josephus explains that Balaam showed 
Balak how to win a victory over the 
Israelites (νίκην Tia... κατ᾽ αὐτῶν 
κερδᾶναι) by enticing them to lust, and 
such a symbolic allusion is quite in the 
manner of the Apocalypse. The Niko- 
laitans, who probably resembled Cerin- 
thus or Carpokrates in their tenets, are no 
better than a Balaam. And the Jewisn 
dictum was (Sank. 106 Ὁ) that whenever 
one discovered anything bad in Balaam’s 
life, one should preach about it. 

Ver. 16. The church as a whole must 
repent of her too tolerant attitude to 
these errorists, but the threatened visi- 
tation is directed against the errorists 
themselves in the shape of some physical 
malady or mortal sickness, according to 
the current belief in early Christianity 


23 


358 


5 xii. 7, xiii." πολεμήσω μετ᾽ αὐτῶν ἐν TH ῥομφαίᾳ τοῦ στόματός μου. 


4, XVil. 14 
(Hebra-  € 
ism 


Shes 
ony); cf. Isa. Ixiii. το. 


(cf. on τ Cor. v. 4-5, 13, xi. 30, Everling: 
die paul. Angelologie, etc., 20f.). Grotius 
refers the threat to the prophetic order 
(‘‘ prophetas suscitabo in ecclesia”). But 
the ethnic conscience generally regarded 
pestilence or any physical calamity as a 
punishment inflicted by the god for some 
offence against his ritual or some breach 
of morals. In the Hexateuch, the sword 
opposes (Num. xxii. 23, 31) and finally 
‘slays (xxxi. 8) Balaam. The run of 
‘thought in the verse is that if the church 
-does not repent, z.e., if she does not act 
-on her own initiative and expel the wrong- 
‘doers (in the hope of them ultimately com- 
ing to a better mind, 1 Cor. v. 4, 5), she 
‘must submit to having them cut out of her, 
and thus being irretrievably lost by death. 
‘The church is responsible for her erring 
members, and the exercise of discipline 
is viewed as a duty to them as well as 
to herself and God. Weak laxity is false 
kindness, the prophet implies; it merely 
exposes offenders to an alternative far 
more dreadful than discipline itself. The 
sword, Vict. remarks on i. 16, is used to 
punish deserters as well as to win victory 
for the faithful. For instrumental év in the 
pre-Christian vernacular, see Tebtunis 
Papyri vol. i. (p. 86) ἐν paxatpy-ats. 
Ver. 17. The reward for those who 
deny themselves pagan pleasures in this 
world is (as in ver. 26) participation in 
the privileges (Pereq Meir 5), reserved 
for God’s people in the latter days (here 
=a victor’s banquet, Gen. xiv. 18), not 
as hitherto (7, 11) simply participation in 
eternal life. The imagery is again rab- 
binic (2 Macc. ii. 4-6, Apoc. Bar. vi. 7-9). 
Previous to the destruction of Jerusalem, 
Isaiah or the prophet Jeremiah was sup- 
posed to have hidden the ark of the cove- 
nant (cf. on xi. 19) with its sacred con- 
tents, including the pot of manna. At 
the appearance of the messiah, this was 
to be once more disclosed (cf. Mechilta 
on Exod. xvi. 25, etc.). It is significant 
how the writer as usual claims for his 
messiah, Jesus, the cherished privileges 
and rights to which contemporary Juda- 
ism clung as its monopoly, and further 
how he assumes that all the past glories 
of O.T. religion upon earth—as well as 
all the coming bliss, which in one sense 
meant the transcendent restoration of 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


Il. 


17. 0 


χων οὖς ἀκουσάτω Ti TO Πνεῦμα λέγει Tats ἐκκλησίαις - Τῷ νικῶντι 
, 53, A a ¢ Ls , ‘ ΄ ΓΒΕ Ἢ a 
δώσω αὐτῷ τοῦ “μάννα τοῦ κεκρυμμένου, καὶ δώσω αὐτῷ ψῆφον 


t Sib. vii. 149, John vi. 31-32; partit. gen. 


these glories—were secured in heaven 
for the followers of Jesus alone (vii. 17, 
xxi. 2, etc.). See Apoc. Bar. xxix. 8, 
where “the treasury of manna will again 
descend from on high,” at the messianic 
period, that the saints may eat of it; the 
Fourth Gospel, on the other hand, fol- 
lows Philo (quis rer. div. 39, leg. allegor. 
ili. 59, 61, etc.) in using manna as a type 
of the soul’s nourishment in the present 
age. There does not seem to be any 
allusion to the rabbinical legend under- 
lying Sap. xvi. 20.—The strange associa- 
tion of manna and white stones, though 
possibly a reminiscence of the rabbinic 
notion preserved in Joma 8 (cadebant 
Israelitis una cum manna lapides preti- 
osi), cannot be explained apart from the 
popular superstitions regarding amulets. 
which colour the metaphor, White 
stones represented variously to the 
ancient mind acquittal, admission to a 
feast (tessera hospitalis), good fortune, 
and the like. But the point here is their 
connexion with the new name. This 
alludes to the mysterious power attached 
in the ancient mind to amulets, stones 
(cf. E.F. i. 546-550, where vignettes are 
given ; also Dieterich’s Mithras-Liturgie, 
31 f.) marked with secret and divine 
names (Jeremias, 79-80, Pfleid. Early 
Christ. Conc. of Christ, 112 f.), the pos- 
session of which was supposed to enable 
the bearer to pass closed gates, foil 
evil spirits, and enter the presence of the 
deity. If the new name (cf. Heitmiiller’s 
Im Namen Fesu, 128 f.), is thus regarded 
as that of Jesus—the irresistible, invin- 
cible name above every name—the pro- 
mise then offers safe entrance through 
all perils into the inner bliss and feast of 
God; the true Christian has a charmed 
life. But when the new name is taken 
to apply to the individual, as seems more 
likely here, another line of interpretation 
is required, and the origin of the phrase 
(though tinged still with this amulet- 
conception of a stone, the more potent 
as it was hidden somewhere on the 
person, cf. Prov. xvii. 8, etc.), is best 
approached from a passage like Epict. i. 
19, where the philosopher is trying to 
dissuade a man from undertaking the 
duties of priesthood in the Imperial cultus 
at Nikopolis. What good will it do him 


17—18. 


ANOKAAYWIZ IQANNOY 


goo 


λευκήν, Kal ἐπὶ τὴν ψῆφον ὄνομα “Kawwdv γεγραμμένον, ὃ οὐδεὶς u Isa. Ixii. 


οἶδεν εἰ μὴ ὁ λαμβάνων. 


2, ἶχν. 15. 
v ΟΠ. on 
Acts xvi. 


“18. Kal τῷ ἀγγέλῳ τῆς ἐν YOuateipors! ἐκκλησίας γράψον, 14. 


10 ῃ the variant τω (Lach., WH, Sw.) for της, cf. ii. 1, 8. 


The singular form, 


Ovarerpy (Q, vg., etc.), is less well supported ; similar collocations of singular (i. 11) 
and plural are not uncommon (E. Bi., 45386, 50645). 


after death, to have his name used to 
mark his year of office in public docu- 
ments? ‘My name will remain,” replies 
the man. ‘ Write it on a stone and it 
will remain,” is the retort of Epictetus— 
plainly a colloquial expression for per- 
manence. This would fit in with the 
Apocalyptic saying excellently (see Schol. 
on Pind. Olymp. vii. 159). Still more 
apposite, however, is an ancient ceremony 
of initiation (as among the aborigines of 
New South Wales: Trumbull, Blood- 
Covenant, 1887, pp. 335-337), by which 
each person, on the close of his novitiate, 
received a new name from the tribe and 
at the same time a white stone or quartz 
crystal. The latter was considered to be 
a divine gift, and was held specially 
sacred, never to be surrendered or even 
shown. These boons formed part of the 
religious covenant which marked the 
entrance of a man into the closest rela- 
tion with the deity of his tribe and also 
into the full enjoyment of manhood’s 
privileges. Hence, if we suppose some 
such popular rite behind the language 
here, the idea is apt: the victor’s reward 
is the enjoyment of mature and intimate 
life with his God (so Victor.). For the 
symbolism of a name as evidence of 
personal identity (and inferentially of 
a new name as proof of a renovated, 
enduring nature), see E.B.D. 75: ‘“ May 
‘my name be given to me in the Great 
House, and may I remember my name 
in the House of Fire. .. . If any god 
whatsoever should advance to me, let 
me be able to proclaim his name forth- 
with ” (the latter clause illustrating Apoc. 
iii. 12). The significance attached by 
the Egyptian religion especially to the 
veu or name was due to the belief that its 
loss meant the extinction of a man’s ex- 
istence. The idea in the prophet’s mind 
is little more than that developed, e.g., 
in Mrs. Browning’s sonnet, “ Comfort” : 
‘Speak low to me, my Saviour, low 
and sweet, From out the hallelujahs 
sweet and low, Lest I should fear and 
fall, and miss Thee,” etc. As the suc- 
ceeding chapters are full of the state 
and splendour of heaven, with royal 
majesty predominating, the prophet finds 


place here for the more intimate and 
individual aspect of the future life, de- 
picting God in touch with the single 
soul (cf. xiv. 1). In addition to this, he 
conveys the idea that outside the Chris- 
tian experience no one can really know 
what God is or what He gives; the re- 
deemed and victorious alone can under- 
stand what it means to belong to God 
and to be rewarded by him.—Wiinsch 
has recently pointed out (Excav. in Pales- 
tine, 1898-1900, p. 186) that, as in Egypt 
the sacred paper (χάρτης ἱερατικὸς) was 
used for solemn appeals to the gods (Brit. 
Mus. Papy7vi, xlvi. 308), ‘‘in like manner, 
doubtless, in Palestine, limestone had 
some superstitious significance, but of 
what special kind we do not know. Per- 
haps it is in this connexion that in Apoc. 
ii. 17 ‘“‘he that overcometh” is to receive 
‘a white stone” inscribed with a “ new”’ 
spell, evidently as an “‘amulet”’. There 
may also be a further local allusion to the 
ψῆφοι and names which were supposed 
to be received by votaries of Asclepius as 
they lay in a trance or dream (Aristides, 
i. 352, 520). For the initiation-custom, 
cf. Spence and Gillen’s Native Tribes of 
Central Australia, pp. 139-:40, where the 
secret, individual name is described as 
given only to those who are ‘ capable of 
self-restraint ” and above levity of con- 
duct. Clem. Alex. (Strom. i. 23) pre- 
serves a Jewish tradition that Moses got 
three names—Joachim, Moses, and 
Melchi (i.¢., king), the last-mentioned ἐν 
οὐρανῷ μετὰ τὴν ἀνάληψιν, ὡς φασὶν οἱ 
μύσται. 

Vv. 18-29. The longest message of the 
seven is to a church in the least im- 
portant of the cities (judged from the 
historical standpoint) Thyatira, a town- 
ship of Northern Lydia, the holy city 
of Apollo Tyrimnaios, adjacent to the 
high road between Perg. and Sardis. It 
soon became a centre of Montanism. 

Ver. 18. χαλκολιβ. Some local al- 
lusion to the bronze-work for which 
Thyatira was famous. Son of God 
(cf. Kattenbusch ii. 563 f.) is practic- 
ally an equivalent for messiah (Luke iv. 
41), or for the superhuman personality of 
Jesus as divinely commissioned (cf. Grill, 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ITQANNOY h 


360 
w Like wy. Τάδε λέγει "6 vids τοῦ θεοῦ, ὁ ἔχων τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς αὐτοῦ ὡς 
26-27, a > 
from Ps. * φλὸξ πυρός, καὶ Tot πόδες αὐτοῦ ὅμοιοι χαλκολιβάνῳ: 19. Οἶδα 
11,750: » RV RR PL geo oe eae , wet 5 , κ᾿ 
only here ou τὰ ἔργα καὶ τὴν " ἀγάπην καὶ τὴν πίστιν καὶ τὴν διακονίαν καὶ 
in Apoc. a 
nine THY "ὑπομονήν σου, kai τὰ ἔργα σου τὰ ἔσχατα " πλείονα τῶν 


In in- 
i t= a a a 
aah 20. ᾿Αλλ᾽ ἔχω κατὰ σοῦ ὅτι ἀφεῖς τὴν γυναῖκα 2 “Ἰεζάβελ 


, 
dim filius, TPWTOV. 


- “ Ν A ‘ > A 

Boe ἡ λέγουσα “ ἑαυτὴν προφῆτιν, kal διδάσκει καὶ πλανᾷ τοὺς “ ἐμοὺς 

(Deissm. 

166-167 ; : ᾧ i ἢ 

Inscript. Maris 7Egei, iii. 174, etc.). xi. 14, of. ἐραυν. ver. 23. y i. 15, cf. ὡς... συντ. 

ver. 27. Fa ARE a b Contrast ii. 4-5, Matt. xii. 45, 2 Pet. ii. 20, cf. Ruth iii. 10. 
c From 2 Kings ix. 22, cf. Sams. A gon. 1034-1045. d Constr. i. 5. e Possess. pron. only here- 

in Apoc. 


1 For φλογα (ACQP, etc., Lach., Al., WH, Ws., Sw.) read the harder φλοξ (δὲ 12 
am., fuld., Pr, Ti., Bs., Bj., sc. εστιν). 

2The well-attested gov after γυναικα (AQ, min., Syr., Areth., Pr., etc., so 
Grot., Al., Zahn, and J. Weiss) may have arisen from the repeated gov previously 
or from 1 Kings xix.-xx. But any such allusion to the wife of the local bishop is 
untenable, and to retain it as = “ thy woman” (Ramsay, Seven Letters, 341) is harsh 


in the extreme. 
Tert. 


pp. 76-77) to carry out God’s purpose for 
his people (cf. John x. 36). But the ex- 
pression has pagan as well as Jewish 
colouring; and there is undoubtedly an 
apologetic allusion to the similar termino- 
logy of the Imperial cultus (cf. Introd. § 6). 

Ver. 19. Instead of being retrograde 
like Ephesus, Thyatira has steadily pro- 
gressed in the works of Christianity. 
The sole flaw noted (see Ramsay’s dis- 
cussions in D. B. iv. 758 f., Seven Letters, 
338 f.) is an undue laxity shown to certain 
members (not, as at Pergamos, a mere 
minority) who, under the sway (ef. 
Zahn. § 73, n. 7) of an influential woman, 
refused to separate themselves from the 
(ἐργασίαι) local guilds where moral 
interests, though not ostensibly defied, 
were often seriously compromised. The 
prophet takes up a puritan attitude, cor- 
roborated by that of the leading church of 
the district (ii. 6); he demands in the 
name of Christ that such inconsistent 
members should withdraw—a severe and 
costly step to take, amid the social ties 
and interests of an Asiatic city, where 
social clubs were a recognised feature of 
civic life and appealed forcibly to several 
natural instincts, especially when backed 
by the approval of an oracular and impres- 
sive leader in the local church. 

Ver. 20. Women (cf. Acts xxi. 9; I 
Cor. xi. 5, and the later Ammia in Phil- 
adelphia: Eus. H. £.v. 17. 2) occasionally 
prophesied in the early church, and false 
prophetesses were as likely to exist as 
false prophets. This ‘ Jezebel of a 
woman, alleging herself to be a pro- 
phetess,” seems to have been some in- 


It is to be omitted with SCP, min., g., vg., Me., Arm. Aeth., 


fluential female (as the definite imagery 
of vv. 21-23 indicates); her lax prin- 
ciples or tendencies made for a connexion 
with foreign and compromising associa- 
tions which evidently exerted a dangerous 
charm upon some weaker Christians in 
the city. The moral issue corresponds 
to that produced by the Nikolaitan party 
at Pergamos (€i8. φαγεῖν, πορνεῦσαι), 
but the serious nature of the heresy at 
Thyatira appears from the fact that it 
was not simply propagated within the 
church but also notorious (ver. 23) and 
long-continued (τέκνα), thanks to ob- 
stinacy among the Ahabs and adherents 
of this prominent woman (ver. 21). They 
prided themselves on their enlightened 
liberalism (ver. 24). The definiteness of 
her personality, the fact of her situation 
within a Christian church which had 
jurisdiction over her, and the association 
of her practices with those of the Nikolai- 
tans, who were members of the church, 
render it impossible to identify this liber- 
tine influence of J. with a foreign institu- 
tion such as the famous shrine of the 
Chaldean Sibyl at Thyatira (Schiirer: 
Theol. Abhandlungen, pp. 39 f., a theory 
suggested by Blakesley, in Smith’s DB), 
or with the wife of the local Asiarch 
(Selwyn, 123). Besides it was not the 
cults but the trade-guilds that formed the 
problem at Thyatira. Jastrow points 
out (p. 267) that for some occult reason 
female sorcerers were preferred to men 
among the Babylonians; ‘the witch 
appears more frequently than the male 
sorcerer”. Hillel (Pirke Aboth, ii. 8: see 
Dr. ὦ. Taylor's note) had already de. 


19—23. 


Γδούλους πορνεῦσαι καὶ φαγεῖν εἰδωλόθυτα. 


, o , g ‘ > θέλ a > a ’ Ξ pit 
Xpovov wa peTavornon, και OU ελει μετανοησαι εκ THS TTOPVELaS 34:0 = 


αὐτῆς. 


22. ἰδοὺ βάλλω αὐτὴν εἰς ἢ κλίνην, καὶ τοὺς ᾿ μοιχεύοντας 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 361 


21. Καὶ ἔδωκα αὐτῇ. i. 3, xix. 


general. 


μετ᾽ αὐτῆς εἰς θλίψιν μεγάλην, ἐὰν μὴ μετανοήσουσιν ἐκ τῶν ἔργων g ii. 22, ix. 


αὐτῆς, 23. 


2of., xvi. 


Ἀ x k , 2A > a > 1 , ‘ ᾿ 
καὶ τὰ "τέκνα αὐτῆς ἀποκτενῶ ἐν θανάτῳ καὶ τι,ο7.54ρ. 


ΧΙ. 23— 


γνώσονται πᾶσαι αἱ ἐκκλησίαι ὅτι ἐγώ εἰμι “6 ἐραυνῶν "νεφροὺς xii. 2. 


iMal. iii. 5, cf. Isa. lvii. 3. 


k 2 Kings x. 7, Sir. xxiii. 24-25, En. x. 9. 
Ezek. xxxiii. 27, Ps. Sol. vii. 4, etc; LXX (θ.-- "\0")- 


h See Jud. 
iX. 2-3. 
1 Jer. xiv. 12, xxi. 7, 


m Clem, Rom. xxi. n am. dey. N.T. 


1¥or epevvov (ΟΡ, etc., Al. Bs.) read (with AC, etc., edd.) the Egyptian 
(Thumb pp. 176-177; Helbing, 7) form epavvav. 


clared, ‘‘ more women, more witchcraft”. 
For the connexion of women and sorcery 
cf. Blau’s Altjiid. Zauberwesen 18 f., 23 f. 
— λέγουσα x.T.A., an irregular nomin. 
absolute, characteristic of the writer. 
This LXX peculiarity of a detached parti- 
ciple thrown into relief, which is not con- 
finedto the Apocalypse (cf. Phil. iii. 16-19, 
etc.), renders the participle almost a re- 
lative (Vit. I., 202) ; but indeed any word or 
group of words, thus singled out as char- 
acteristic of some preceding noun, tends 
to become independent and to take its 
own construction (II. 8f). See Zeph. i. 
12 (LXX). 

Ver. 21. The immorality was flagrant ; 
more flagrant still was the obstinate per- 
sistence in it, despite admonitions and 
forbearance (cf. Eccles. viii. 11; Bar. 
Ap. xxi. 20; 2 Peter iii. 9). This allu- 
sion to an abuse of God’s patience and 
to a warning given already (hardly in 
some writing like Jud. 2 Peter, Spitta) is 
left quite indefinite; it was probably 
familiar enough to the first readers of the 
book. Interests and old associations 
had proved hitherto too strong for this 
prophetic counsel to be followed. Mem- 
bership of a trade-guild, although it ne- 
cessarily involved the recognition of some 
pagan deity and often led to orgies, ‘‘ was 
a most important matter for every trades- 
man or artisan; it aided his business, 
and brought, him many advantages 
socially ” (Ramsay). 

Ver. 22. κλίνην (bed, not a couch of 
revelry) aegritudinis non amoris; disease 
or sickness (cf. for the phrase, 1 Macc. 
i, 5) the punishment of error, especially 
of error accompanied by licentiousness. 
The inscriptions from Asia Minor abound 
with instances of the popular belief that 
impurity, moral and even physical, was 
punished by disease or disaster to oneself, 
one’s property, one’s children. Sickness 


might even go the length of death (1 Cor. 
xi. 29-30). The prophet, however, seems 
to avoid calling Jesus or God σωτὴρ or 
oolwy, a term appropriated by the po- 
pular religions of Phrygia and lavished 
on many deities as healers and helpers 
(C. B. P. i. 262 f.). —potx., men and 
women who imitate her licentiousness, 
@X., physical distress, illness.—peravoy- 
σουσιν, the fut. indic., expresses rather 
more probability than subj. with éav py 
(cf. Blass, ὃ 65,5). For tense of βάλλω 
see Zech. νι]. 7, LXX, etc. 

Ver. 23. τέκνα, literally, perhaps with 
an indirect allusion to the killing of 
Ahab’s seventy sons. ἄποκτ. θ. (Hebra- 
ism), “1 will utterly slay”; see on 
vi. 8. If any particular form of death 
is meant, it may be pestilence (the in- 
scriptions often mention fever), which 
represented to an Oriental mind the pun- 
ishment of God on man’s unfaithfulness. 
The curious difference between the treat- 
ment of the μοιχ. and the τέκνα is due 
to the fact that (cf. Dan. vi. 24), a parent’s 
sin was visited upon his family, both in 
Jewish and in contemporary pagan belief 
(cf. the Phrygian inscription, cited by 
Mayor on Jas. v. 12, κατηράμενος ἤτω 
αὐτὸς καὶ Ta τέκνα αὐτοῦ). Yet even 
when both classes are allegorised into 
active coadjutors and deluded victims, 
the relative punishment looks unequal. 
John, unlike Ezekiel (xiii. 17-23), holds 
that the victims of the false prophetess 
are willing and responsible for their posi- 
εἰοη.---πᾶσαι αἱ ἐκκλ., the judgment 
was to be as notorious as evidently the 
scandal had been. The idea recalls one 
of Ezekiel’s favourite conceptions.—éya 
κιτιλ. “I know the abysses,” and ‘‘dis- 
cerner of hearts and searcher of the reins”’ 
were old Egyptian titles for divine beings. 
This intimate knowledge of man (cf. 
16 c) pierces below superficial appear- 


362 


ts “ » - 
o Ps. νἱ!. 9, καὶ “ καρδίας - καὶ "δώσω ὑμῖν ἑκάστῳ κατὰ τὰ ἔργα ὑμῶν. 


XXVI. 2, 
εἰς. 
p Ps. Ixii. 


£3, cf. 
Apoc. xx. 
12, XXii. 
12,2Clem. 
XViii. 4, 
etc. Fresh clause, indep. of ὅτι, begins here. 


ances, ¢.g., connexion with the church, 
prophetic zeal, and plausible excuses. 
As in Jer. xvii. 10, xx. 12 (cf. Ps. Sol. 
viii. 8), the divine acquaintance with 
man’s real, secret life forms the basis 
of unerring and impartial judgment; 
while, as in Jer. iv. 16, 17 (cf. Acts iv. 
Tif; ot, elim.) 1:20; τ (Conve αὐ ΡΟ.) 
the prophetic denunciation or impreca- 
tion has a direct effect upon the person 
denounced (cf. von Dobschiitz, 270 f.). 
The former would be a fairly novel idea 
to most of those accustomed to the 
Roman religio, which was ‘one of ob- 
servance, sacrifice, and outward act, 
that in no way searched the heart of 
the worshipper—a system of rules which 
covered the circumstances of Roman 
life” (H. O. Taylor, Ancient Ideals, i. 
417, 418). 

Ver. 24. To know “ the depths”’ of the 
divine being and counsel was a charac- 
teristic claim of the Ophites and the later 
Gnostics; cf. Iren. adv. Haer. ii. 22, 1 
(qui profunda bythi adinuenisse se dicunt; 
cf. 3), and Tertullian’s sarcastic descrip- 
tion (adv. Vdlent. τὴ, ‘‘ Eleusinia Ualen- 
tiniana fecerunt lenocinia. sancta silentio 
magno, sola taciturnitate coelestia. Si 
bona fide quaeris, concreto uultu, sus- 
penso supercilio Altum est aiunt.” ‘The 
depth of knowledge” was a phrase of 
Herakleitus, the famous Ephesian_philo- 
sopher, and in the creed of the Dukho- 
bortsui, a sect in modern Russia, the Holy 
Spirit is Depth, the Father being Height 
and the Son Breadth. Since ὡς λέγουσιν 
refers to the errorists themselves, the 
quoted phrase about ‘‘knowing the 
depths of Satan” may (i.) contain an in- 
dignant and sarcastic retort; ‘“ depths of 
—Satan,” not “ God,” as they boast (rod 
o. being substituted for τοῦ θεοῦ) ; such 
teaching and principlesaresimply infernal. 
Or (ii.) as is more probable the words may 
voice the actual claim of the errorists, 
who considered that some accommoda- 
tion to pagan practices gave them a 
necessary acquaintance with the mean- 
ing of evil (so e.g., Spitta, Pfleiderer, 
Zahn, Jiilicher, Bousset). Their higher 
standing gave them immunity from any 
risks. They could fathom securely what 


ATIOKAAY¥IZ LQANNOY 


EI. 


24. 


A A - An , ” x 
Ὑμῖν δὲ λέγω τοῖς λοιποῖς τοῖς ἐν Θυατείροις, ὅσοι οὐκ ἔχουσι THY 
διδαχὴν ταύτην, οἵτινες οὐκ ἔγνωσαν τὰ “βαθέα τοῦ Σατανᾶ, ὡς 

-“ a κι 
λέγουσιν, "Od βάλλω ἐφ᾽ ὑμᾶς ἄλλο βάρος: 25. πλὴν ὃ ἔχετε 


q 1 Cor. ii. ro. τ Cf. 1 John v. 3. 


the immature orthodox called immorality. 
Devil-study, or even devil-worship (xiii. 4 
is quite different) was not uncommon in 
some of the Gnostic sects throughout 
Asia Minor, e.g., the Cainites, the Naas- 
senes, and the Ophites (the earliest 
Gnostics, φάσκοντες μόνοι τὰ βάθη 
γινώσκειν, Hipp. adv. Haer. v. 6). The 
idea was that as the principle of evil 
would ultimately be redeemed, it might 
be used meantime for the advantage of 
the initiated. Compare Mansel’s Gnostic 
Heresies. pp. 73, 96, 105. In En. Ixv. 6 
the unrighteous are punished for their 
acquaintance with “all the secrets of the 
angels and all the violence of the Satans 
and all their hidden power and all the 
power of those that practise sorcery, and 
the power of witchcraft.” The influence 
of a movement like Gnosticism, whose 
motto was evitis sicut deus scientes bonum 
et mdlum, gave wide opportunities to 
immorality, in its more popular applica- 
tions. It produced the same sort of union 
between subtlety and sensualism which 
can sometimes be traced within Hindu- 
ism. In contrast to this unwholesome 
temper of speculation, the prophet substi- 
tutes for speculative flights the obedience 
of the normal Christian praxis (cf. Parad. 
Lost, viii. 170-197, xii. 561-589), with a 
plain allusion to the Jerusalem concordat 
of the early church which is recommended 
tacitly as a safe, wise rule of conduct. 
In the case of the βαθέα τοῦ σατανᾶ, 
ignorance is bliss. John is totally un- 
sympathetic to the local liberals. He 
does not combat the theoretical prin- 
ciples at the root of their movement. 
Like the prophets who wrote Jude and 
2 Peter, he attacks instead of arguing, 
quite content to judge it by its moral 
fruits of libertinism. He bitterly declares 
that such occasional results are the 
deliberate object of the party. The 
strange collocation of this error with the 
habit of partaking of sacrificial food is 
probably due to the prophet’s stern con- 
viction that the latter, with its friendly 
and liberal attitude to pagan customs, 
fostered the former, in the case of people 
who took an ultra-spiritual view of Paul’s 
principle of Christian freedom. 


24--28. 11]. 1. 


κρατήσατε, " ἄχρι οὗ ἂν ἥξω. 


τέλους τὰ ἔργα μου, δώσω " αὐτῷ ἐξουσίαν ἐπὶ τῶν ἐθνῶν. 27. καὶ 


ποιμανεῖ αὐτοὺς ἐν " ῥάβδῳ σιδηρᾷ, 


, “- 
" συντρίβεται, " ὡς κἀγὼ εἴληφα παρὰ τοῦ πατρός pou: 28. 7 καὶ 


δώσω αὐτῷ τὸν ἀστέρα τὸν πρωϊνόν. 


τί τὸ Πνεῦμα λέγει ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις. 


“TIT. τ. Καὶ τῷ ἀγγέλῳ τῆς ἐν Σάρδεσιν ἐκκλησίας γράψον, υ 


ν Cf. Mic. ν. 5, Isa. x. 24-26. 
y Doubie promise here only (exc. iii. 12 ?). 


Ver. 26. Triumph here consists in un- 
flagging attention to the duties of a 
Christian vocation, The ἔργα are (xiv. 
12, xix. 8) the normal activities of this 
calling, viewed as the outcome of a per- 
sonal relation to Jesus; they are “ his,’ 
as commanded by him and executed in 
his strength. The general idea of nye 
and the following verse is that the only 
irresistible force is the force of a life 
which is able to resist seduction and 
compromise, because it holds to faith 
and purity. The promise of reward, 
preceding (as in 111. 5, 12, 21) the appeal 
for attention, is couched in terms of 
messianic conquest (from Ps. ii. 8, 9). 
In a more or less figurative form, the 
tule of the saints, a cherished hope of 
Jewish eschatology, had its own attrac- 
tion for some circles of early Christianity 
(see on v. 10 and 1 Cor. vi. 3; and for 
ῥάβδῳ, the well-known flail wielded by 
Horus, the Egyptian god of requital or 
warfare): evidently it appealed to their 
eagerness for a righting of present wrongs 
and a reversal of the immoral sway of 
captain ill over captive good. ‘The 
ἐξουσία ἐπὶ τῶν ἐθνῶν (by which they 
are not governed but shivered in irrepa- 
rable ruin; cf. Isa. xxx. 14, Jer. xix. 11) is 
defined with ferocious detail in 27; the 
whole description is modelled on a tradi- 
tionally messianic application of (LXX) 
Ps. ii. 8, 9. For the shepherd’s staff as a 
royal sceptre see E. Br. 4317. ὡς κἀγὼ 
«.T.A., God, Christ, and the individual 
Christian as in iii. 21 (John xvii. 16-22). 
“Tilud ὡς aliquam similitudinem, non 
paritatem  significat”” (Rosenmiiller). 
John xxi. 15-17 is not ‘‘a deliberate cor- 
rection of this terrible sentence” (Sel- 
wyn, 195), but the mature expression of 
Christian solicitude in a different province, 
from which messianic incongruities have 
been wholly purged. 

Ver. 28. To “grant the morning- 
star” (a characteristically loose usage of 
δίδωμι) means, not to invest him with its 


ATIOKAAYWIZ L[QANNOY 


w xli. 5, xix. 15, cf. Bar. iv. 25. 


363 


26. Καὶ ὁ νικῶν καὶ ὃ *typav ἄχρι 8.“ Till 


such time 
as I 
come” 
(eschat., 
as 111. 11): 
ἥξω aor. 
subj. from 
ἥξα. 
ti. 3, sug- 
gested by 
Κρατς 25. 
Resuming 
nom. 
absol. 
x Cf. John xiv, 6f., etc. 


ὡς τὰ σκεύη τὰ κεραμικὰ 


29. Ὁ ἔχων οὖς ἀκουσάτω 


glory, nor to give him possession of Christ 
himself, but (so Bleek, after Victor.) to 
make the dawn of salvation or of life 
eternal shine on him after his dark afflic- 
tions. The victor shares in the divine 
life (with its punitive government) and 
honour above, or rather in the new 
messianic era of Jesus himself (see note 
on xxii. 16, where by a further applica- 
tion the metaphor is directly connected 
with Jesus). Staunch adherence to the 
truth on the part of leaders and confes- 
sors is similarly rewarded in Dan. xii. 3, 
En. civ. ii. Semitic folklore found some 
mystic connexion between the countless 
brilliant stars in heaven and the departed 
faithful, who became immortal (4 Esd. 
vii. [97]), and the sense here might be 
that the loyal Christian was sure of shining 
like a star in immortality; cf. Ign. ad 
Rom. ii. 2, καλὸν τὸ δῦναι ἀπὸ κόσμου 
πρὸς Θεὸν, ἵνα εἰς αὐτὸν ἀνατείλω (and 
passage cited oni. 10). But xxii. 16 (cf. 
Job iii. g) tells against this, as does Ign. 
ibid. vi. 2 (speaking of his martyrdom) 
ἄφετέ pe καθαρὸν φῶς λαβεῖν. ἐκεῖ 
παραγενόμενος ἄνθρωπος ἔσομαι. The 
collocation of the morning star and the 
judicial authority over the nations may 
have been suggested to the prophet’s 
mind (cf. 14, 20) by the prophecy, read 
in a messianic sense, of Num. xxiv. 17. 
The sequence and the Christian spirit 
of the whole promise are certainly im- 
proved if we omit 27 a with Selwyn (194) 
and Jacoby (Neutest. Ethtk, 1899, p- 
446) and Wellhausen (with 23-28 a), since 
the doubled promise and the later use of 
the metaphor do not justify any suspi- 
cion of 28 as a gloss (so Kénnecke, 
p. 34). But it is as likely that the author 
himself (cf. xvii. 14) added this co-opera- 
tion with the vindictive messiah (cf. xii. 5, 
xix. 15), as that an early copyist was 
responsible for the insertion. 

CuapTER III.—Vv. 1-6. The message 
to Sardis. The title of the speaker 
(drawn from i. 4, 16, 20), as general as 


364 


a Herod. 
vil. 138 
οὔνομα 
εἶχε; ὡς ὃς 
ew ᾿Αθήν- El. 
as ἐλαύ- τ ᾿ 
νει, Plato θανεῖν - οὐ γὰρ 
Hipp. - 

Μα]. 28:0. Θεου μου. 

b Jas. ii. 17, x ; 
τ Tim. v. Και μετανοήησον. 
6: Philo, 
de pro- 
fug. § 10. 

e Eph. v. 14. 

d Ezek. xxxiv. 4, 16 (Helbing 85). 
xvii. 8. g il. 5, 16. 
poral acc. as Xi. 2, 6, 9, ΧΙΪ. 6. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ [LQANNOY 


e See Gal. iii. 2f., Heb. x. 32 ἢ. 
h Jer. xlix. 9, Matt. xxiv. 43=Lk. xii. 39, see on 1 Thess. v. 2. 


TM. 


Τάδε λέγει 6 ἔχων τὰ ἑπτὰ πνεύματα τοῦ Θεοῦ καὶ τοὺς ἑπτὰ 
ἀστέρας - Οἶδα σοῦ τὰ ἔργα, ὅτι “ὄνομα ἔχεις ὅτι ζῆς, καὶ > νεκρὸς 
an A τὰ 
2. Γίνου “γρηγορῶν, καὶ “στήρισον τὰ λοιπὰ ἃ ἔμελλον ἀπο- 
εὕρηκά σου ἔργα πεπληρωμένα ἐνώπιον τοῦ 
e , a AL fser . > \ , 
3. “μνημόνευε οὖν πῶς ᾿ εἴληφας kal ἤκουσας, Kal τήρει 
2X 3 Ν , gz eo. Ah λέ Ν 
ἐὰν οὖν μὴ γρηγορήσῃς, "ἥξω ὡς: " κλέπτης, καὶ 


3 AY a 9i ’ φ 4 SLLN , 
ou μη γνῷς ποιαν @pav ἥξω επὶι σε. 


4. ᾿Αλλὰ ἔχεις ὀλίγα 


f John iii. 11, 33, xiv. 17, 
i Tem 


1 ra bef. epya is om. by Lach., WH, Ws., Sw. (AC, 1 mg.). 
2For yvws (ACP, τ, etc., Areth., Al., Ws., Bs., Sw., Bj.) Lach. Ti. Tr. WH 


(marg.) read the correct ywwon with SQ, vg., Aeth., Syr., Ande, Pr., 


in the similar letter to Ephesus, has no 
special bearing on the subsequent ad- 
dress, unless an antithesis be implied 
between the plenitude of the divine 
spirit and the deadness of a church 
which had the name or credit of being 
“alive”. The sweeping verdict of ver. 
1 upon the formalism of the local church 
—which had lapsed from its pristine 
vitality, just as the township of S. had 
by this time declined from its old his- 
torical prestige—is modified by the re- 
cognition of better elements not yet too 
far gone in decay to be recovered (2) and 
of a goodly nucleus of members. The 
metaphor is paralleled by a Jewish esti- 
mate of orthodoxy (Kidd. 71 δ) which 
dubbed Mesene as “dead,” Media as 
“ill,” Elymais as ‘in extremis,’ and 
the strict inhabitants of the Ghetto be- 
tween the Tigris and the Euphrates as 
‘healthy ”. 

Ver. 2. ἔμελλον, epistol. impfi—oov 
ἔργα, ‘“‘any works of thine”. Judged 
from the Divine standpoint (ἐνωπ. 6.), no 
matter how satisfactory is the verdict of 
outsiders upon her or of her own com- 
placency, her condition is decadent. 

Ver. 3. Memory again the lever for 
repentance (as at ii. 5); εἴληφας aoristic 
pf. (cf. v. 7, Burton 88) rather than pf. of 
existing result (Weiss, Bs.); πῶς = our 
colloquial ‘“ how ” (practically equivalent 
to “that”). The melancholy feature 
about contemporary indifference at 5. 
was that it had a fine beginning behind 
it: yet this very circumstance afforded 
hopeful ground for an appeal. καὶ τήρει 
(the primitive deposit of the faith) καὶ (to 
secure this steadfast adherence) μετανόη- 
σον (aor., sharp and decisive act of re- 
pentance). As ver. 4 (compared with ver. 
2) implies, positive stains were visible in 


the local church no less than sins of 
mere omission. Sardis and Laodicea, 
which apparently were the only members 
of this group untroubled by outside perse- 
cution or inward error, were the least 
satisfactory of all the seven. ἐὰν οὖν μὴ 
γρηγορήσῃς, although the need is so 
desperate (cf. below on xvi. 15). The 
sudden and signal visitation of punish- 
ment threatened in the following words 
(for ὥραν in acc. cf. Moult. i. 63, Abbott’s 
Diat. 2013) is left vaguely impressive. 
It may be that (as in Jude 4, 18, and 2 
Peter) jocal libertinism meant a slackening 
of belief in the second Advent. 

Ver. 4. ὀλ. dv. “quasi paucos no- 
minatos, i.e., bonos qui nominatione digni 
sunt” (cf. the use of πρόσωπα = per- 
sons or individuals, in Clem. Rom. and 
Ignat.). ἐμόλ. (cf. Fragment of Un- 
canonical Gospel, Oxvrhyn. 2 cent. 
A.D., line 16 pepoduppévos ἐπάτησας, 
k.T.A.) the sullied garment an emblem of 
moral stains, including but not identical 
with that of wopvevew (xiv. 4, cf. Sir. 
xxii. 1, 2). The language reflects that ot 
the votive inscriptions in- Asia Minor, 
where soiled clothes disqualified the 
worshipper and dishonoured the god. 
Moral purity qualifies for spiritual com- 
munion (note the dramatic contrast of 
this ἄξιοι [cf on ii. 16] with that of xvi. 
6); the apocalyptic beatitude is: blessed 
are the pure in life, for they shall join 
God (see on xiv. 14, xix. 8). Note here 
only in the seven messages an escha- 
tological promise unintroduced by the 
phrase 6 νικῶν, although ver. 5 really 
repeats the same idea. ottws=“ as being 
victor ” (i.e., accordingly). The idea of 
heavenly raiment is distinctively Persian 
(Brandt, 575, 580; Ltiken, 122), but per- 
meates Jewish eschatology from Enoch 


2—7. 


k 1 


ὀνόματα ἐν Σάρδεσιν ἃ οὐκ 


, ais aA > a me ” , > 
περιπατήσουσι μετ᾽ ἐμοῦ ἐν λευκοῖς, “STL ἄξιοί εἶσιν. 
¢ a e ¢ , a Ν > ‘ 
οὕτως περιβαλεῖται ἑν ἱματίοις λευκοῖς - καὶ οὐ μὴ 

lel nw ~ lel 34 
ὄνομα αὐτοῦ ἐκ τῆς " βίβλου τῆς ζωῆς, καὶ ἢ ὁμολογήσω τὸ ὄνομα 6). 
αὐτοῦ " ἐνώπιον τοῦ πατρός μου καὶ ἐνώπιον τῶν ἀγγέλων αὐτοῦ. 
i ~ , 
6. Ὁ ἔχων οὖς ἀκουσάτω τί Td Πνεῦμα λέγει Tats ἐκκλησίαις. 
~ ~ , i. 
“ἡ. Kat τῷ ἀγγέλῳ τῆς ἐν Φιλαδελφίᾳ ἐκκλησίας γράψον, 5. 


6, I, xvii. 5, 2, etc. See Herm. Vis. I. 3, 2, Sim. ix. 24, 4, Clem. Rom. xlv. 8, εἰσ. _ 
p Reminisc. of syn., Matt. xii. 32, Lk, xii. 8. 


Xvii. 8, xx. 12, 15, XXi. 27, En. cviii. 2. 


(Ixii. 15, 16, the elect clothed after the 
resurrection in eternal ‘‘ garments of 
glory”) down to Slav. En. xxii. 8; 4 
Esd. ii. 39, 45 (cf. Herm. Sim. viii. 2) 
and Asc. Isa. iv. 16 (garments = spiritual 
bodies in which the saints are vested at 
the last day, stored up in seventh heaven; 
cf. viii. 26, ix. 24 f., uidi stolas multas et 
thronos et coronas jacentes). περιβαλεῖται 
k.1-A., like Joshua (Zech. iii. 3 f.) ; or (as 
others suggest) like priests acquitted be- 
fore the Sanhedrin, who were robed in 
white. In the Apoc., as in En. Ixxxv.- 
xc., white is the colour of righteousness, 
associated with innocence (and joy? 
Eccles. ix. 5), just as black with evil. 
In Apoc. Pet. 5, the dwellers in Paradise 
are clothed in ἔνδυμα ἀγγέλων φωτινῶν, 
whilst the angels who (ver. 6) chastise 
the wicked are robed in black. All such 
metaphors reflect the primitive notion 
that clothing somehow could form almost 
a part of a man’s personality, correspond- 
ing to his identity and character (E. Bi. 
1140, 1141}, rather than the Roman 
custom of assuming a white toga uirilis 
to mark entrance upon manhood’s privi- 
leges (“uitae liberioris iter,” Ovid).— 
τῆς βίβλου τῆς ζωῆς, this favourite 
symbol of the Apocalypse whith goes 
back even to pre-exilic Judaism (Jsa. iv. 
Bc; Exod. xxx. 32 Εἰ etc.;) for the 
Babylonian background, cf. Jeremias, 
69 f.), had through the influence of Dan. 
(xii. I) a great vogue in apocalyptic 
dreams as an apt image no longer of a 
share in the temporal felicity of God’s 
reign but of personal salvation. For a 
name to be erased from the book of life 
{one’s deeds not corresponding, upon 
scrutiny, to one’s position; cf. xx. 
12, Jub. xxxvi. 10) meant condemnation, 
or exclusion from the heavenly kingdom. 
To have one’s name retained (‘‘ and never 
will I blot out,” etc.) on the list of 
heavenly citizens was by this time a 
current metaphor for eternal fellowship 
~with God and his people, and (by a 


ATIOKAAY¥IZ [QANNOY 


ἐμόλυναν τὰ ἱμάτια αὐτῶν" 


365 


καὶ k xi. 13, see 
on Acts 


c -“ 
5. Ὁ νικὼν 15, εἴς,, 
ΕΏΟΙΧΧΟΣ 


7 ἐξαλείψω TO | Jude 23 
Isa. lxiv 
m Cf.ignat. 
Smuyrn. 
FE 2) 
Herm. 
Sim, viii 


n Cf. Jos. 
nt. vi. 
Ov. 1, xiii. 8 


natural inference drawn in xiii. 8) for 
predestination, the belief in which formed 
then as always a vivid inspiration in dis- 
tress and conflict. For the erasure of 
names from the civic register, consequent 
upon their owners condemnation, cf. 
Dio Chrys. xxxi. 336 c, ὅταν δημοσίᾳ 
τινὰ δέῃ τῶν πολιτῶν ἀποθανεῖν ἐπ᾽ 
ἀδικήματι, πρότερον τὸ ὄνομα αὐτοῦ 
ἐξαλείφεται; Xen. Hell. ii. 3, 51, and 
Arist. Pac. 1180. Also Dittenberger’s 
Sylloge inscript. Graec.? 439” (iv. B.c.) 
ὃς δ᾽ ἂν δόξηι μὴ ὧν φράτηρ ἐσαχθῆναι, 
ἐξαλειψάτο τὸ ὄνομα αὐτὸ ὁ ἱερεύς, and 
Orientis Greci Inscr, Sel. 218135 (iii. B.C.) 
ἐξαλείψαντας TO ὄνομα τὸ ἐκείνου. The 
special comfort of this verse is intelligible 
when one reads the prayer offered in con- 
temporary Jewish worship (cf. Shmone- 
Esreh xii. Palest. recension) : ‘‘ for apos- 
tates let there be no hope, may the 
kingdom of the haughty quickly collapse 
in our days, and may the Nazarenes and 
the Minim suddenly perish, may they be 
blotted out of the book of Life and not 
enrolled along with the righteous ”’. 

The message to Sardis, the most vehe- 
ment of the seven,has scme interesting re- 
semblances to that addressed to Ephesus ; 
cf. ii, T= ili. I, 11. 5 (pynp-)=ili. 3, ii. 5 
(visitation) =ili. 5, 19 O=iii, 4. The 
hope described in ver. 5 is burlesqued by 
Lucian (Peregr. xl.) who describes his 
pseudo-Christian hero as seen after death 
περιπατοῦντα ἐν λευκῇ ἐσθῆτι, φαιδρόν, 
κοτίνῳ τε ἐστεμμένον. The metaphori- 
cal references to raiment gain point in 
view of the local trade in woollen goods 
and dyed stuffs. 

Vv. 7-13. The message to Philadelphia. 

Ver. 7. ἐν Less than twenty years 
later an equally favourable account of 
the local church was given by Ignatius (ad 
Phil. 3, 5, 10).. ἅγιος «.7.A., Jesus is 
a messiah indeed, one deserving that 
honoured name and realising its mean- 
ing. The favourite Johannine term 
ἀληθινός (=‘‘ true,” in the wider sense 


366 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LOANNOY 


11: 


4 Unly here Τάδε λέγει ὁ ἅγιος ὁ ἀληθινός, ὁ ἔχων Thy ᾿ κλεῖν τοῦ " Δαυείδ, ὃ 


= Christ 


’ 4 , 
(cf. Acts ἀνοίγων καὶ οὐδεὶς κλείσει Kal κλείων καὶ οὐδεὶς ἀνοίγει " 


iil. 14, iv. 
271 30). 
John vi. 
69, etc.), 
in Apoc. 
Hendia- 


dys = ὁ ἀληθῶς ἅγιος (Grot.)? “ Holy and true,” of God vi. το, cf. iv. 8. 
orthographical forms in εἰ or c, see Win. ὃ 5, 13, 32, generally (ὃ 9, 7). 
u Constr. vii. 2, 9, xiii. 8, 12, xx. 8, cf. xii. 6, 14, xvii. 9; redundant Heb. use, 


ii. 12, Col. iv. 3. 
Win. § 22, 7. 


3. 


[οἷδά cou τὰ Epya:]} ἰδοὺ δέδωκα ἐνώπιόν cou * θύραν " ἠνεωγμένην, 


- Ν 
ἣν οὐδεὶς δύναται κλεῖσαι “ αὐτήν - ὅτι μικρὰν ἔχεις δύναμιν, καὶ 


ΤΊ. 18. s On such 
t 1 Cor. xvi. 9, 2 Cor. 


1 Pr. om. οιδα σου τα epya (so Hauss. i. 211-212, breaking connection and har- 


monistic). 


of ‘‘genune,” opposed to unreal rather 
than to untruthtul, cf. Justin’s Dial. 
exvi., Athen. vi. 253 c: no pseudo- 
messiah, as local Jews asserted, cf. 
8c and g) is here grouped with ἅγιος 
(i.e., not merely=legitimately messianic 
as in John x. 36, Clem. Rom. xxiil. 
5, but freed from creaturely weakness 
and imperfection, his nature in intimate 
touch with the divine fulness, Issel: 
der Begriff der Heiligkeit im N.T., 
1887, pp. 70, 110, R.$. 305), as in ili. 
14, xix, II, xxi. 5, xxii. 6 with πιστός, 
and in xv. 3, xvi. 7, six. 2 with δίκαιος. 
Slightly otherwise, Apoc. Bar. Ixvii. 7: 
‘‘He is true, so that he* shall do you 
good and not evil,” and below at xvi. 
7 (though this sense might suit here 
also, as an amplification of ἅγιος). 
κλεῖν κιτιλι (based on Isa. xxii. 22) the 
messiah, as Davidic scion, possesses the 
absolute power of admission to and ex- 
clusion from the divine realm. This part 
of the title (cf. Job xii. 14, ἐὰν κλείσῃ 
κατὰ ἀνθρώπων τίς ἀνοίξει :) alludes to 
what immediately follows as well as to 
the arrogant claim mentioned in ver. 9. 
Christ alone, the heavenly κλειδοῦχος, 
has the right to excommunicate. Com- 
pare Savonarola’s brave reply to the 
bishop of Vasona who had pronounced 
his sentence of degradation (separo te ab 
ecclesia militante atque triumphante) :— 
Militante, non triumphante: hoc enim 
tuum non est. 

Ver. 8. οἶδά. . . ἔργα, as in the case 
of Smyrna implying unqualified approval. 
The reward of this steadfastness (8 c, 10) 
is threefold: (a) security in their relation 
to God (ὃ δ), through the love of Christ 
for them (9); (ὁ) ultimate triumph over 
their foes (0), and (c) deliverance in the 
final crisis (10). The open door, here as 
in Paul (for the ethnic use of the term 
on sepulchres cf. C. B. P., ii. 395) is 
usually taken to denote facilities for 
preaching and advancing the faith among 
outsiders, in which case the sense would 


be that the extension of the gospel de- 
pends upon, as it forms a high reward 
of, open confession and a decided stand 
for Christ. But in view of a passage 
written by Ignatius to this very church 
(ad Philad. 3, where Christ himself is 
termed θύρα τοῦ πατρὸς, δι᾽ ἧς εἰσέρχο- 
νται the patriarchs, prophets, apostles, 
καὶ ἡ ἐκκλησία) and of Clem. Rom. xlviii. 
(where the gate of righteousness is de- 
scribed as open in Christ), the phrase 


‘is better connected with Christ himself, 


not with any good opening for Christian 
activity. He makes access to God 
through himself sure; despite trials and 
temptations (vv. 8, 9, 10) his church’s 
standing is guaranteed by his authority 
(as in John x. 7, 9, Christ 4 θύρα τῶν 
προβάτων). θύρα here is the open heart 
of God for man; in ver. 20, man’s open 
heart for God. Jesus, then, equipped 
with the O.T. attributes of divine au- 
thority, assures the church how futile 
are such excommunications as the Jews 
were levelling against them. The latter 
have nothing to do with the conditions 
of the kingdom. Faith in Jesus consti- 
tutes a relation to God which cannot 
either be impaired or rivalled. Only, the 
perseverance of the saints is needed; an 
assured position with God depends not 
merely on Christ’s will and power but on 
Christian loyalty as the coefficient οἵ 
grace. The church at P. is not blamed 
for the slenderness of her equipment, 
which evidently is due to causes outside 
her control. She is praised for having 
made good use of the slight resources 
she possessed (cf. Mark xiv. 8). Other- 
wise, though less well, a full stop might 
be placed after αὐτήν, and ὅτι... τὸ 
ὄνομα pov taken as the reason for the 
promise ἰδοὺ ... oe, just as in ver. Io 
ὅτι. . . pov is followed by kayo... 
γῆς.--οΟἫὀὐτήν, pleonastic use of pron. after 
relative, a Semitic idiom with Greek 
affinities (Vit. ii. 138, Thumb 128, Blass. 
8 50, 4) confined to Apoc. (exc. cit. f:. LXX, 





8---το, 


ἐτηρησάς μου τὸν λόγον, καὶ οὐκ ἠρνήσω τὸ ὄνομά μου. 
διδῶ ἐκ τῆς συναγωγῆς τοῦ “Σατανᾶ, τῶν λεγόντων 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 367 


9. ἰδοὺ ¥ Irreg. 

; a form,WH 

€QUTOUS 174, 
Deissm. 


3 , 3 ‘ 
Ιουδαίους εἶναι, καὶ οὐκ εἰσὶν ἀλλὰ ψεύδονται: ἰδοὺ " ποιήσω 102. 


3 ‘ xo o 3 ol A 
αὐτοὺς “iva ἥξουσι καὶ 7 προσκυνήσουσιν ἐνώπιον τῶν ποϑῶν σου; 


ἈΝ “- 
καὶ γνῶσιν ' ὅτι ἐγὼ " ἠγάπησά σε. 


lone iv. 35, V. 42, etc., ἵνα =infin. of conseq. as ix. 20, Xili. 13. 
z John xi. 36, cf. Ps. 1xii. 8, Zech. viii. 20 f., John xvii. 23. See on xxi, 9. 


Dan. Xii. 3. 


1For γνωσιν ACPQ, etc., Syr., Arm., Aeth., Andr., Areth. 


W 11. 9, = 
ee hypo- 
crites,” 


10. Ὅτι ἐτήρησας τὸν "λόγον Did. viii. 


Xs 
x Constr. 

y Isa. xlix. 23, xlv. 14, Ix. 14. 

ai.g, cf. Sir. ii. 14, 


(edd.), the variant 


yvwon(, 14, Sah., Pr.) is preferred by Wellh. (cf. ii. 23 and Isa. xlix. 23). 


Acts xv. 17)in N.T, In Enoch (xxxviii. 
2, and passim) to deny the Lord of Spirits 
is the capital crime,’ as opposed to “‘ be- 
lieving in hisname . 

Ver. 9. διδῶ ἐκ (partit. gen., the con- 
struction being dropped and resumed in 
a rather harsh anacolouthon, ἵνα «.7.A.). 
The absence of ἐκ before Aey. does not 
prevent it from being interpreted as in 
apposition to συναγωγῆς rather than as 
directly dependent on 886. On the 
forms of δίδωμι in Apocalypse see 
Jannaris’ Hist. Gk. Gramm. 996, 51; 
the wide usage of the verb is carried 
on through the LXX from the equally 
extended employment of the Hebrew 
equivalent in the later stages of O.T. 
literature. The Jewish synagogue is 
denounced as Satanic, owing to its per- 
secuting habits (Satan being regarded 
as the final source of persecution as of 
error, cf. above ver. ὃ and on ii. 9). 
lgnatius corroborates the malign acti- 
vity of Jews at Philadelphia, who were 
in the habit of molesting the church (ad 
Philad. 6); he also refers them to the 
malicious cunning of Satan. Appa- 
rently Judaizing tendencies were rife 
among Christians of Gentile birth at 
Philadelphia. As in writing to Smyrna, 
the prophet thereforeclaimed the ancestral 
title ‘‘Jew” for the Christian church. 
Faith in Christ, not mere nationality, 
constituted true Judaism; the succession 
had passed to Christianity. The promin- 
ence assigned to this phase of polemic 
is characteristic of the eriod, though 
already presaged by Paul (in Rom. ix. 
6-7, ii. 28, 29). The supercilious con- 
tempt of these churchmen for all Chris- 
tian dissenters from Judaism was to be 
changed one day into humble respect. 
The former would find out their grievous 
mistake when it was too late. καὶ mpoc- 
κυνήσουσιν, κιτιλ., in the spirit and 
realistic language of post-exilic Judaism 
(see reff.), denoting abject submission and 


homage before the glory of the church in 
the future messianic reign (slightly other- 
wise in 1 Cor. xiv. 25). What they fondly 
expected from the Gentiles, they were 
themselves to render to Christians—such 
would be the grim irony of providence. 
Compare with what follows, the earlier 
expectation of Jub. i. 25: ‘‘and they 
shall all be called children of the living 
God, and every angel and spirit will 
know, yea they will know that these are 
my children, and that I love them”. 
kal γνῶσιν, «.T.A., still Isaianic in col- 
ouring (from xliii. 4, xlix. 23). Christ’s 
love to his church (ἦγ. =‘‘ 1 have loved ”’) 
will be proved by her triumphant survival 
of perils. Her final position, when the 
conditions of earth are reversed, will 
throw light upon the divine affection 
which underlay her previous persever- 
ance, and which meantime is a secret 
save to those who experience it. The 
promise of dominion over the Jews here 
corresponds to that of authority over the 
Gentiles in ii. 26, 27, except that the 
latter is definitely eschatological. The 
Jews tardily awaken to the privileges of 
the church as to the claims of Jesus (see 
on i. 7). Probably they scoffed at the 
claim of the Philadelphian Christians to 
be objects of the true God’s love. The 
answer is that faith in Jesus means a 
revelation of Divine love (the revelation 
of it), apart from which no Christian life 
can be accounted for. 

Ver. 10. The position of pov shows 
that it belongs not to τὸν λόγον τῆς 
ὑπομονῆς as a whole, but to ὑπομονῆς 
(2 Thess. iii. 5). The precise sense 
therefore is not ‘‘my word about pati- 
ence” (i.e., my counsel of patience as. 
the supreme virtue of these latter days, 
so Weiss, Bousset, etc.), but ‘‘the word, 
or the preaching, of that patience which 
refers to me” (i.¢., the patient endurance 
with which, amid present trials, Christ is- 
to be served; so Alford, Spitta, Holtzm.). 


308 


b Matt. 
XXiv.21 ἢ, 


Vii. 3, ix. Ξ SA es a 
ae aeK κατοικοῦντας ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς. 
7 


-c Ὁ comfort μηδεὶς λάβῃ τὸν στέφανόν σου. 


nota 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IOQANNOY 


τῆς ὑπομονῆς pou, κἀγώ σε τηρήσω ἐκ τῆς ὥρας Tod 
cf. Apoc. τῆς " μελλούσης ἔρχεσθαι ἐπὶ τῆς οἰκουμένης ὅλης, πειράσαι τοὺς 
II. “ἔρχομαι ταχύ: “ κράτει ὃ ἔχεις, ἵνα 


ὙΠ 


Ὁ πειρασμοῦ 


12. “Ὁ νικῶν, ποιήσω αὐτὸν 


(XX1i.7,20 = τ A a ‘ 
7120) t στύλον ἐν τῷ ναῷ τοῦ Θεοῦ pou, ξ καὶ ἔξω οὐ μὴ ἐξέλθῃ ἔτι, καὶ 


threat (ii. 
16), cf. 

XXii. 12. I 
Win. ὃ 22, 5a, Abbott, Diat. 1920. 


.g Emphatic, as opposed to Isa. xxii. 25. 


See Ps. xxxviii. (xxxix.), 8: καὶ νῦν τίς ἡ 
ὑπομονή μου; οὐχὶ ὁ κύριος : The second 
reason for praising the Philadelphian 
Christians is their loyal patience under 
persecution, as well as the loyal confes- 
sion of Christ (ver. 8) which had possibly 
brought on that persecution. κἀγὼ 
«tA. (I in turn”; cf. similar con- 
nection in John xvii. 6-8), a reproduction 
of the saying preserved in Luke xxi, 36. 
The imminent period τοῦ πειρασμοῦ 
refers to the broken days which, in 
eschatological schemes, were to herald 
messiah’s return. Later on, this period 
is specifically defined as a time of seduc- 
tion to imperial worship (cf. xiii. 14-17, 
vil. 2, with Dan. xii. 1, LXX). The 
Philadelphian Christians will not only 
triumph over the contempt and intrigues 
of their Jewish foes but also over the 
wider pagan trial (which is also a tempta- 
tion), inasmuch as their devotion, already 
manifested in face of Jewish malice, 
will serve to carry them through the 
storm of Roman persecution. The re- 
ward of loyalty is in fact fresh power 
to be loyai on a higher level: ‘the 
wages of going on, and ever to be’. 
This seems better than to take the world- 
wide trial as the final attempt (viii. 13, 
xi, το, etc.) to induce repentance in men 
or to punish them, from which the P. 
Christians (cf. vii. 1-8, and Ps. Sol. xiii. 
4-10, xv. 6, 7) would be exempt; but it is 
impossible from the grammar and difficult 
from the sense, to decide whether τηρεῖν 
ἐκ means successful endurance (pregnant 
sense as in John xvii. 15) or absolute 
immunity (cf. 2 Peter ii. 9), safe emerg- 
ence from the trial or escape from it 
entirely (thanks to the timely advent of 
Christ, ver. 11). Note the fine double 
sense of τηρεῖν; unsparing devotion is 
spared at least some forms of distress 
and disturbance. It is like Luther’s 
paradox that when a man learns to say 
with Christ, ‘“‘The cross, the cross,” 
there is no cross. Rabbinic piety (Sanh. 
98 δ) expected exemption from the tribula- 
“tion of the latter days only for those who 


ἃ ii. 25, cf. 4 Macc. vi. 18-21, Heb. x. 36. ῃ 
f Gal. ii. 9 (see Legft.’s note), Isa. xxii. 23, Jer. i. 18. 


e Nom. pendens, as ii. 7. For constr., 


were absorbed in good works and in 
sacred studies. 

Ver. 11. ‘You have not long to wait 
and suffer now”; a fresh motive for 
tenacity of purpose. Compare with what 
follows the tradition of R. Simon (in 
Tract. Shabb. bab. 88 a) that on the occa- 
sion of Exod. xxiv. 7, the Israelites were 
each crowned with two crowns by 600,000 
angels—one when they said we will do, 
the other when they said we will be 
obedient; but on the occasion of Exod. 
xxxilil. 6 these crowns were snatched off 
by 1,200,000 devils. In the last day, at 
the messianic age, God restores these 
crowns (according to Isa. xxxv. 10). The 
sense is not altered if ἵνα . . . σου (like 
Luke xii. 20) is taken as a vivid form of 
the passive ‘‘ lest thou be deprived of thy 
crown ” (cf. Col. ii. 18 with 2 Tim. iv. 8), 
forfeiting it through misconduct. 

Ver. 12. The reward of steadfastness 
here is a stable relation to God and ab- 
solute (trebly verificd) assurance of cternal 
life. permanence ἐν τῷ ναῷ (verbally 
inconsistent with xxi. 22) τοῦ θεοῦ 
pov (four times in this verse). From 
Strabo (xii. 868 B, ἥ τε Φιλαδελφία... 
οὐδὲ τοὺς τοίχους ἔχει πιστούς, ἀλλὰ 
καθ᾽ ἡμέραν τρόπον τινὰ σαλεύονται καὶ 
διΐστανται: xiii. 936 Β, πόλις iA. 
σεισμῶν πλήρής" οὐ γὰρ διαλείπουσιν 
οἱ τοῖχοι διϊστάμενοι, καὶ ἄλλοτ᾽ ἄλλο 
μέρος τῆς πόλεως κακοπαθῶν, K.T.A.) We 
learn that the city was liable to frequent 
and severe earthquakes, one of which had 
produced such ruin a while ago (Tac. 
Ann. ii. 47) that the citizens had to be 
exempted from Imperial taxation and 
assisted to repair their buildings. These 
local circumstances (cf. Juv. vi. 411; Dio 
Cass. lxviii. 25; Renan, 335) lend colour 
to this promise, which would also appeal 
to citizens of a city whose numerous fes- 
tivals and temples are said to have won 
for it the sobriquet of ‘a miniature 
Athens” (Ε. Bz. 3692). The promise is 
alluded to in Ep. Lugd., where God’s 
grace is said to have “ delivered the weak 
and set them up as στύλους ἑδραίους 


rII—Iz2. 


4 53 ἜΡΟΝ Ἄν ἊΝ A 6 a ‘ a > ~ Sy. h 
γράψω ἐπ΄ αὐτὸν TO ὄνομα τοῦ θεοῦ μου καὶ τὸ ὄνομα τῆς πόλεως 

A 6 fol hoa fol ε λή £4 ΄ ΩΣ - 
τοῦ θεοῦ μου, “τῆς καινῆς Ἱερουσαλήμ, ἣ ᾿ καταβαίνουσα ὁ ἐκ τοῦ 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 369 


3 


Gal. iv. 
26, Heb. 
1. TO; Kile 
22,Xiii.14. 
i See on xxi. 
2,10; false apposition. 


1The ungrammatical ἡ καταβαινουσα (Sy*AC) has been corrected into ἡ κατα- 
βαινει (Q, Andr., Ar.) and τῆς καταβαινουσης (N°). 


able by means of their patience to stand 
all angry onsets of the evil one,” and 
Attalus of Pergamos is termed a στύλον 
καὶ ἑδραίωμα of the local Christians. 
Permanent communion with God is fur- 
ther expressed in terms of the widespread 
ethnic belief that to be ignorant of a 
god’s name meant inability to worship 
him, whereas to know that name implied 
the power of entering into fellowship 
with him. “Just as writing a name 
on temple-walls puts the owner of the 
Name in continual union with the deity 
of the temple, so for early man the know- 
ledge, invocation and vain repetition of 
the deity’s name constitutes in itself an 
actual, if mystic, union with the deity 
named” (Jevons’ Introd. Hist. Religion, 
1896, p. 245; cf. Jastrow, p. 173). Kal 
γράψω, k.T.A., inscriptions upon pillars 
bcing a common feature of Oriental 
architecture, cf: Cooke’s North Semitic 
Inscriptions, p. 266, names on pillars; 
also Keitzenstein’s Poimandres,20. The 
provincial priest of the Imperial cultus 
erected his statue in the temple at the 
cose of his year’s official reign, inscribing 
on it his own name and his father’s, his 
place of birth and year of office. Hence 
some of the mysterious imagery of this 
verse, applied to Christians as priests of 
God in the next world. This is more 
}robable than to suspect an allusion to 
what was written on the high priest’s 
forehead (Exod. xxviii. 36, cf. Apoc. vii. 
3, Xiv. I, xvil. 5, xxii. 4). Pillars were 
also, of course, sculptured now and then 
in human shape. For the first (a) of the 
three names, cf. Baba Bathra, 75, 2: R. 
Samuel ait R. Jochanan dixisse tres 
appellari nomine Dei, justos (Isa. xliii. 
7), Messiam (Jer. xxiii. 6), Hierosolyma 
(Ezek. xlviii. 35); also Targ. Jerus. on 
Exod. xxviii. 30, quisquis memorat 
illud nomen sanctum [i.e., τετραγράμμα- 
tov] in hora necessitatis, eripitur, et 
occulta reteguntur. Where a name 
was equivalent in one sense to personality 
and character, to have a divine name 
conferred on one or revealed to one was 
equivalent to being endowed with divine 
power. The divine “hidden name” 
(Asc. Isa. i. 7 Jewish: ‘as the Lord liveth 
whose name has not been sent into this 


world,” cf. viii. 7) was (according to En. 
Ixix. 14 f.) known to Michael, and had 
talismanic power over demons. Perhaps 
an allusion to this also underlies the apo- 
calyptic promise, the talismanic metaphor 
implying that God grants to the victorious 
Chris:ian inviolable safety against evil 
spirits (cf. Rom. viii. 38, 39). The second 
(6) name denotes (cf. Isa. lvi. 5, Ezek. 
xlvili. 35) that the bearer belongs not 
merely to God but to the heavenly city 
and society of God. Since rabbinic 
speculation was sure that Abraham had 
the privilege of knowing the mysterious 
new name for Jerusalem in the next 
world, John claims this for the averace 
and honest Christian. On the connexion 
between the divine name and the temple, 
see 3 Macc. ii. Ὁ, 14, Judith .x. 8, etc. 
The third (c) ‘‘ my own new name” (xix. 
12) is reflected in Asc. Isa. ix. 5 (the Son 
of God, et nomen eius non potes audire 
donec de carne exibis); it denotes some 
esoteric, incommunicable, pre-existent 
(LXX of Ps. Ixxi. 17, En. Ixix. 26, cf. R. F. 
249, 344) title, the knowledge of which 
Meant power to invoke and obtain help 
from its bearer. The whole imagery 
(as in ii. 17, xix. 12) is drawn from the 
primitive superstition that God’s name, 
like a man’s name, must be kept secret, 
lest if known it might be used to the 
disadvantage of the bearer (Frazer’s 
Golden Bough, 2nd ed. i. 443 f.). The 
close tie between the name and the per- 
sonality in ancient life lent the former a 
secret virtue. Especially in Egyptian 
and in Roman belief, to learn a god’s 
name meant to share his power, and 
often “ the art of the magician consisted 
in obtaining from the gods a revelation of 
their sacred names”. The point made 
by the prophet here is that the Christian 
God bestows freely upon his people the 
privilege of invoking his aid successfully, 
and of entering into his secret nature; 
also, perhaps, of security in the mys- 
terious future across death. See the 
famous ch. cxxv. of E. B. D. where the suc- 
cessive doors will not allow Nu to pass till 
he tells them their names (cf. chapters cxli. 
f.). Ignatius tells the Philadelphians (ob- 
viously referring to this passage, ad Phil. 
6) that people unsound upon the truth of © 


ΠΟ ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LOANNOY rn, 
ΠΕ οὐρανοῦ ἀπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ μου, καὶ τὸ "ὄνομά μου τὸ καινόν. 13. Ὁ 
Ἐν ον ἔχων οὖς ἀκουσάτω τί τὸ Πνεῦμα λέγει ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις. 
Exes (ὦ cee aay τῷ ἀγγέλῳ τῆς ἐν Λαοδικίᾳ ἐκκλησίας γράψον, Τάδε 
ἀν Λα δ: ὁ Api, ὃ AGA TuS ὃ uueee | καὶ yan ἡ " ἀρχὴ τῆς 
τ κτίσεως τοῦ θεοῦ: 15. Οἶδά σου τὰ ἔργα, ὅτι οὔτε ψυχρὸς εἶ οὔτε 
n= Genu- 


tne, Did., xiii. 1-2. 


Jesus Christ are to him στῆλαι καὶ τάφοι 
'γεκρῶν, ἐφ᾽ ois γέγραπται μόνον ὀνόματα 
ἀνθρώπων. The μόνον is emphatit. In 
the survival of P. during the later con- 
quests which left the other six towns of 
the Apocalypse more or less ruined, 
Gibbon (ch. Ixiv.) irrelevantly finds “a 
pleasing example that the paths of honour 
and safety nay sometimes be the same ”. 

Vy. 14-22. The message for Laodicea, 
where a church existed by 60 a.p. (Col. 
iv. 16). 

Ver. 14. Jesus is the Amen because he 
guarantees the truth of any statement, 
and the execution of any promise, made 
by himself. He is consequently the 
faithful and true witness, whose counsel 
and rebuke (18, 19) however surprising 
and unwelcome, are therefore to be laid 
to heart as authoritative. A faithful 
witness is one who can be trusted never 
to misrepresent his message, by exag- 
geration or suppression, (ἀληθινός practi- 
cally = ἀληθής as often, since a real 
witness is naturally a truthful and com- 
petent one) his veracity extending not 
only to his character but to the con- 
tents of his message. In point of sin- 
cerity and unerring insight (as opposed 
to “ false’? in both senses of the term), 
Jesus is the supreme moral critic; the 
church is the supreme object of his criti- 
cism. He is also absolutely trustworthy, 
and therefore his promises are to be be- 
lieved (vv. 20, 21), or rather God's pro- 
mises are assured and realised to men 
through him (cf. π. καὶ a. in 2 Macc. ii. 
11). Compare the fine Assyrian hymn 
of Ishtar (Jastrow, p. 343): “ Fear not! 
the mind which speaks to thee comes 
with speech from me, withholding noth- 
ing. . . . Is there any utterance of mine 
that I addressed to thee, upon which 
thou couldst not rely?” (also, Eurip. 
fon 1537). The resemblance of 4 ἀρχή 
K.T.A,, toa passage in Colossians is note- 
worthy as occurring in an open letter to 
the neighbouring church of Laodicea 
(Philonic passages in Grill, pp. 106-110). 
Here the phrase denotes “the active 
SOurce or principle of God's universe or 
Creation ” (ἀρχή, as in Greek philosophy 


ο See on Col. i. 15 f., also Just. A fol. ii. 6, Diognet. vii. 


and Jewish wisdom-literature,=aitia or 
origin), which is practically Paul’s idea 
and that of Johni. 3 (‘tthe Logos idea 
without the name Logos,” Beyschlag). 
This title ΟΥ̓“ incipient cause” implies a 
position of priority to everything created; 
he is the first in the sense that he is 
neither creator (a prerogative of God in 
the Apocalypse), nor created, but creative. 
It forms the most explicit allusion to the 
pre-existence of Jesus in the Apocalypse, 
where he is usually regarded as a divine 
being whose heavenly power and position 
are the outcome of his earthly suffering 
and resurrection: John ascribes to him 
here (not at xii. 5, as Baldensperger, 85, 
thinks) that pre-existence which, in more 
or less vital forms, had been predicated of 
the messiah in Jewish apocalyptic (cf. 
En. xlviii.). This pre-existence of mes- 
siah is an extension of the principle of 
determinism ; God foreordained the salva- 
tion itself as well as its historical hour. 
See the Egyptian hymn: ‘He is the 
primeval one, and existed when as yet 
nothing existed; whatever is, He made 
it after He was. He is the father 
of beginnings. . . . God is the truth, 
He lives by Truth, He lives upon Truth, 
He is the king of Truth.”’ The evidence 
for the pre-existence of messiah in Jew- 
ish Christian literature is examined by 
Dr. G. A. Barton, fourn. Bibl. Lit. 1902, 
pp. 78-91. Cf. Introd. ὃ 6. 

Ver. 15. The moral nausea roused by 
tepid religion. It is best to be warm, 
and energetic; but even a frank repudia- 
tion of religion is at least more promising 
from an ethical standpoint (Arist. Nzk. 
Eth. vii. 2-10) than a half-and-half attach- 
ment, complacently oblivious ofany short- 
coming. The outsider may be convinced 
and won over; there is hope of him, for 
he is under no illusion as to his real re- 
lation to the faith. But what can be 
done with people who are nominal Chris- 
tians, unable to recognise that they need 
repentance and that Jesus is really out- 
side their lives (ver. 20)? Cf. Dante’s 
Inferno, iii. 30 f. For such homely meta- 
phors and their effectiveness, compare 
the critigism of Longinus in περὶ ὕψους 


<3—18. 


Ἁ ae 
PLeatds* “ὄφελον ψυχρὸς ἧς ἢ ἵεστός - 16. οὕτως ὅτι 
καὶ οὔτε Leatds οὔτε ψυχρός, μέλλω σε 
17. ὅτι λέγεις, " ὅτι " πλούσιός εἰμι καὶ “ πεπλούτηκα καὶ οὐ- qC/. Moult. 


μου. 


ΔΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


371 


“ ν 
"xAtapds εἶ,» ἄπ, λεγ, 
As hay Of 
τ ἐμέσαι ἐκ τοῦ στόματός Rom. xii. 
Il. 


i. 200, 


, ‘ ᾿ 
Sev! χρείαν ἔχω, καὶ οὐκ οἶδας ὅτι σὺ εἶ " ὁ ταλαίπωρος καὶ ἐλεεινὸς Helbing, 


καὶ πτωχὸς καὶ τυφλὸς καὶ γυμνός - 18. συμβουλεύω σοι ἀγοράσαι 


Matt. xii. 33? Epict. iii. 15, 13. 
1 Cor. iv. 8, 2 Cor. viii. 9. 


ram. Aey. N.T. 
u Hos. xii. 8 (9), Zech. xi. 5. 


73:74, 

Win. § 12, 

5. or 

idea, 

s John i. 32, cf. Plato’s Symp., 204a. 
v Art. as in Lk. xviii. 13. 


lovSevos (ΡΟ, 1, Areth, etc.) is a correction of the difficult and original ουδὲν 
{‘‘like nil opus est,” Simcox: cf. Epict. iii. 7) AC, 12, Andbav, edd. 


(xxxi.): “‘Sometimes a plain expression 
like this tells more forcibly than elegant 
language; being drawn from common 
life, it is at once recognised, whilst its 
very familiarity renders it all the more 
convincing”. The spirit of the verse re- 
sembles that which pervaded Christ’s 
denunciation of the religious authorities 
in his cay for their ὑπόκρισις, and his 
more hopeful expectations with regard 
to the harlots and taxgatherers (Ecce 
Homo, ch. xiii.); the former condition 
of religious life was to Jesus a sickening 
feature in the situation. Just as spiritual 
death, in the case of the Sardis Chris- 
tians, meant a lost vitality, so in the case 
of Laodicea lukewarmness implies that 
a condition of religious warmth once ex- 
isted. ‘He who was never fervent can 
never be lukewarm.” In his analysis of 
this state (Growth in Holiness, ch. xxv.), 
Faber points out not only that its corre- 
lative is a serene unconsciousness and 
unconcern (cf. ver. 17 6), but that one 
symptom is a complacent attention to 
what has been achieved (cf. 17 a) rather 
than sensitiveness to what is left undone, 
with ‘‘a quiet intentional appreciation of 
other things over God” (cf. ver. 20), 
which is all the more mischievous that 
it is not open wickedness. 

Ver. 16. The divine disgust at luke- 
warm religion. Christ, says the prophet, 
is sick of the lukewarm: as the purpose 
(μέλλω) of rejection does not exclude 
the possibility of a change upon the part 
of the church which shall render the 
execution of the purpose needless, advice 
to repent immediately follows upon the 
threat. The latter is unconditional only 
in form. Exclusion from God’s life forms 
one side of the penalty, humiliating ex- 
posure before men the other (18). 

Ver. 17. Priding herself not merely on 
the fact but (as is implied) on the means 
vy which it had been secured (v7z., per- 
sonal skill, merit) and finally on the in- 
dependent self-reliant position thus at- 
tained: a profuse certificate of merit, 


self-assigned. To conceit and self-decep- 
tion the prophet wrathfully ascribes the 
religious indifference at Laodicea. ‘‘No 
one,”’ says Philo (Fragm. p. 649, Mang.), 
“is enriched by secular things, even 
though he possessed all the mines in the 
world; the witless are all paupers.” 
The reference is to spiritual possessions 
and advantages. It is irrelevant to 
connect the saying with the material 
wealth and resources of Laodicea, as 
exemplified in the fact that it was re- 
built by its citizens after the earthquake 
in 60-61 a.r. without help from the im- 
perial authorities (Tacit. Ann. xiv. 27). 
For one thing, the incident is too far 
back ; for another, the Apocalypse is con- 
cerned not with the cities but with the 
Christian churches. Such an allusion 
may have been in the writer’s mind, 
especially if the church included in its 
membership prosperous and influential 
citizens, since complacency and self-satis- 
faction are fostered by material comfort. 
‘Tf wealthily then happily,” in Laodicea 
as in Padua. Still, these weeds spring 
from other soils as well. An inefficient 
ministry (cf. Col. iv. 17) and absence of 
persecution or of special difficulties -at 
Laodicea probably helped to account for 
the church’s languid state. As John sug- 
gests, the church which is truly rich in 
spiritual and moral qualities does not 
plume itself upon them (ii. 9). οὐκ οἶδας, 
cf. the echo of this in Oxyrhynchite Logia, 
i. 3: τυφλοί εἰσιν τῇ καρδίᾳ αὐτῶν καὶ 
οὐ βλέπουσιν, πτωχοὶ καὶ οὐκ οἴδασιν 
τ]ὴν πτωχιαν (2), where blindness and 
poverty and unconsciousness of both 
occur. ov, emphatic; ἐλεεινός, ‘needing 
pity”? rather than (as Dan. ix. 23, x. 11, 
LXX) ‘finding pity”; tad. (cf. with 
ver. 19, Sap. ili, 11: σοφίαν yap καὶ 
παιδείαν ὁ ἐξουθενῶν ταλαίπωρος), only 
here and Rom. vii. 24 in N.T., two 
passages representing the extremes of 
misery—unconscious and conscious. ὃ 
κιτιλ. = ‘the embodiment of”’. 

Ver. 18. The counsel is conveyed in the 


372 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


ΠΤ, 


1 τοὺς ὀφθαλμούς σου 


wAfor- παρ᾽ ἐμοῦ χρυσίον “ πεπυρωμένον " ἐκ "πυρὸς ἵνα πλουτήσῃς, καὶ 
gotten τς ὰ S ie h: ᾿ ‘ on ex) 15 ΄ A 
eee ε΄. ἱμάτια ᾿ λευκὰ ἵνα περιβάλῃ καὶ μὴ φανερωθῇ ἡἣ ΄“ αἰσχύνη τῆς 
ol. ii. 3 ps 
iv. 16. γυμνότητός σου - καὶ ᾿κολλούριον " ἐγχρῖσαι 
x Zech. xiii. 


9. For ἵνα βλέπῃς. Ῥ 


constr. ii. 
II, Vili. 11 
= dative. 


Ig. ἐγὼ 


y iii. 4, vii. 9, 14, xix. 14. 


z See on xvi. 15. 
ili. 11-12 = Heb. xii. 5-6, Ps. Sol. x. 2, 1 Cor. xi. 32. 


ὅσους ἐὰν φιλῶ “ ἐλέγχω kal Traded: 


a 1 John ii. 20, 27. b Prov. 
ς John iii. 20, xvi. 8 (R.J. 365), Sir. xviii. 13. 


1For εγχρισον (P, I, 92 marg., 96, etc.) tead eyxptoat (infin. not imper; the 
technical term; Gz. Aey. in N.T.) with SAC, etc., vg., Pr., Anda, edd. 


dialect of the local situation. ἀγοράσαι 
in the poor man’s market (Isa. lv. 1, of. 
Matt. vi. 19, 20), significant words as 
addressed to the financial centre of the 
district. ‘From me,” is emphatic; the 
real life is due to man’s relation with 
Christ, not to independent efforts upon 
his own part. Local Christians needed 
to be made sensitive to their need of 
Christ; in Laodicea evidently, as in 
Bunyan’s Mansoul, Mr. Desires-awake 
dwelt in a very mean cottage. ‘‘ Re- 
fined” =genuine and fresh, as opposed 
to counterfeit and traditional (cf. Plato, 
Rep. iii. 413 ¢, 416 δ). For παιδεία 
wrought upon the people of God by a 
divine Davidic king whose words are 
πεπυρωμένα ὑπὲρ χρυσίον τίμιον, see 
Ps. Sol. xvii. 47, 48.---ἰ μάτια. Laodicea 
was a famous manufacturing centre, 
whose trade largely consisted of tunics 
and cloth for garments. The allusion is 
(cf. below, on ver. 20 and xvi. 15) to care- 
less Christians caught off their guard by 
the suddenness of the second advent. 
κολλούριον or κολλύριον (cf. the account 
of a blind soldier’s cure by a god [Aescu- 
lapius ?] who bade him κολλύριον συντ- 
ρῖψαι, Dittenberger’s Sylloge Inscript. 
Graec. 807, 15 f.), an eye-salve for tender 
eyes: an allusion to the ‘ Phrygian 
powder ’”’ used by oculists of the famous 
medical school at Laodicea (C. B. P. 
i. 52). To the Christian Jesus supplies 
that enlightenment which the Jews found 
in the law (Ps. xix. 8); ‘‘uerba legis corona 
sunt capitis, collyrium oculis” (Tvact. 
Siphra fol. 143, 2); ‘‘uerba legis corona 
sunt capitis, torques collo, collyrium 
oculis” (Vajikra R., fol. 156, 1). True 
self-knowledge can be gained only by 
the help of Christ, i.e., in the present 
case mediated by Christian prophecy. 
Like Victor., Lightfoot (Colossians, p. 44) 
interprets this allusion by the light of 
Eph. i. 8, Col. i. 27, as a rebuke to the 
vaunted intellectual resources of the 
Church; but there is no need thus to 
narrow the reference. It is to be ob- 
served that John does not threaten Lao- 


dicea with the loss of material wealth 
(cf. Pirke Aboth, cited above on ii. 9) in 
order to have her spiritual life revived. 
Ver. 19. The prophet now relents a 
little; the church has still a chance 
of righting herself. Such a reproof as 
he has given in Christ’s name, and the 
discipline it involves (παιδεύω, wider 
than ἐλ.) are really evidence of affection, 
not of antipathy or rejection. This is the 
method of God at least (ἐγώ, emphatic ; 
‘whatever others do”’), with whom cen- 
sure does not mean hostility. φιλῶ, the 
substitution of this synonym (contrast 
Heb. xii. 6) for the LXX ἀγαπᾷ is re- 
markable in view of the latter term’s 
usage in the Apocalypse; the other 
variation ἐλέγχω καὶ παιδεύω (ἐλ. B, 
παιδ. δὰ Α, LXX) is probably ornate rather 
than a duplicate. The love of Christ for 
his people is mentioned in the Apoca- 
lypse only here (with a reminiscence if 
not a quotation of O.T.), ini. 5, and in 
iii. g (incidentally). In the latter pas- 
sage, the divine love sustains and safe- 
guards those who are loyal; here it in- 
flicts painful wounds upon the unworthy, 
to regain their loyalty. {nAeve (pres.)= 
a habit, μετανόησον (aor.)=a definite 
change once for all. The connexion 
(ovv) seems to be: let the foregoing re- 
buke open your eyes at once to the need 
of repentance, and also to the fact that it 
is really love on my part which prompts 
me thus to expose and to chastise you; 
such a sense of my loving concern, as 
well as of your own plight, should kindle 
an eager heat of indignation (2 Cor, viii- 
II, ἄλλα ζῆλον) gathering into a flame 
of repentance that will burn up indiffer- 
ence and inconsistency (cf. Weinel, 188 
f.). The urgent need of immediate re- 
pentance rests not only on the special 
character of the temptation to which the 
local Christians were succumbing (‘It is 
a great grace to find out that we are 
lukewarm, but we are lost if we do not 
act with vigour. It is like going to sleep 
in the snow, almost a pleasant, tingling 
feeling at the first, and then—lost for 


10---21. 


ζήλευε οὖν καὶ μετανόησον. 


κρούω - “ ἐάν τις " ἀκούσῃ τῆς " φωνῆς μου καὶ ἀνοίξῃ τὴν θύραν, 
καὶ εἰσελεύσομαι ' πρὸς αὐτὸν καὶ ᾿ δειπνήσω pet αὐτοῦ καὶ αὐτὸς 
21. Ὁ “νικῶν, δώσω αὐτῷ ἢ" καθίσαι μετ᾽ ἐμοῦ ἐν τῷ 


μετ᾽ ἐμοῦ. 


3; crying “ open" (apert), cf. John x. 3. f Gen. 
nom. (Abbott, Diat. 2421). hx Macc. x. 63, cf. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


373 


20. Ἰδοὺ ἕστηκα ἐπὶ τὴν θύραν καὶ ἃ And 


not 7-- 
then fate 
of Matt. 
XXVi. 64. 
e Constr. 
xiv. 13, 
XV. 1, XXi. 
XXVi. 29-31, En. Ixii. 14-15. g Ver. 12, Suspended 
Lk. xxii. 30, a reminiscence of Col. iii. 1, Eph, ii. 6? 


1 Before εισελευσομαι add (Hebraistic, introd. apodosis, x. 7, xiv. 10) καὶ 40, etc., 


And¢, Pr. (Ti., WH marg., Bj., Bs.): the 
βου Kat from the text used by Orig., Hil., 


apparent absence of ακουση τῆς φωνης 
Epiph. might suggest that the words were 


a natural though (as their excellent textual attestation shows) an early gloss upon 


ανοιξη. 


ever,” Faber), but on the fact that this 
warning was their last chance. 

Ver. 20. The language recalls Cant. 
Vv. 2 (φωνὴ ἀδελφιδοῦ μου κρούει ἐπὶ τὴν 
θύραν - ἄνοιξον μοι, for contemporary 
evidence of the allegorical use of Can- 
ticles see Gunkel’s note on 4 Esdras. v. 
20 f. and Bacher’s Agada d. Tannaiten, 
i. 109, 285 f. 425, etc.) interpreted in the 
eschatological sense (γινώσκετε ὅτι ἐγγύς 
ἐστιν ἐπὶ θύραις Mark xiii. 29 = Matt. 
xxiv. 33) of the logion in Luke xii. 35- 
38 upon the servants watching for their 
Lord, ἵνα ἐλθόντος καὶ κρούσαντος 
εὐθέως ἀνοίξωσιν αὐτῷ (whereupon, as 
here, he grants them intimate fellowship 
with himself and takes the lead in the 
matter). To eat with a person meant, for 
an Oriental, close confidence and affec- 
tion. Hence future bliss (cf. En. Ixii. 14) 
was regularly conceived to be a feast (cf. 
Dalman i. § 1, C. 4a and Volz 331), or, 
as in Luke xxii. 29, 30 and here (cf. ver. 
21), feasting and authority. This tells 
against the otherwise attractive hypo- 
thesis that the words merely refer to a 
present repentance on the part of the 
church or of some individuals in it (so e.g. 
de Wette, Alf., Weiss, Simcox, Scott), as 
if Christ sought to be no longer an out- 
sider but a welcome inmate of the heart 
(cf. Ruskin’s Sesame and Lilies, § 95). 
The context (cf. 18 and 21),a comparison 
of xvi. 15 (which may even have origin- 
ally lain close to iii. 20), and the words of 
Jas. v. 9 (ἰδοὺ ὁ κριτὴς πρὸ τῶν θυρῶν 
ἕστηκεν) corroborate the eschatological 
interpretation (so e.g. Diist -rdieck, Pfleid., 
Bousset, Forbes, Baljon, Swete, Holtz- 
mann), which makes this the last call 
of Christ to the church when he arrives 
on the last day, though here Christ stands 
at the door not as a judge but as a friend. 
Hence no reference is made to the fate 
of those who will not attend to him. 
In ii. 5 and 16, ἔρχομαι σοι need not 
perhaps be eschatological, since the com- 
ing is conditional and special, but ἔρχομαι 


VOL. V. 2 


“= 


S. reads καὶ avovger (thus beginning the apodosis). 


by itself (iii. 11) and ἥξω (ii. 25) must be, 
while iii. 3 probably is also, in view of the 
context and the thief-simile. The immi- 
nent threat of iii. 16 is thus balanced by 
the urgency of iii. 20. For the eschato- 
logical ἰδού cf. i. 7, xvi. 15, xxi. 3, xxii. 
7,12. φωνῆς, implying that the voice is 
well-known. To pay attention to it, in 
spite of self-engrossment and distraction, 
is one proof of the moral alertness 
(Cy Aeve) which means repentance. For 
the metaphorical contrast (reflecting the 
eternal paradox of grace) between the 
enthroned Christ of 21 and the appealing 
Christ of 20, cf. the remarkable passage 
in Sap. ix. 4, 6f., τὸ f., where wisdom 
shares God’s throne and descends to toil 
among men; also Seneca’s Epp. xli. 
(quemadmodum radii solis contingunt 
quidem terram, sed ibi sunt unde mitt- 
untur; sic animus magnus et sacer con- 
iiersatur quidem nobiscum, sed haeret 
origini suae [Apoc. v. 6]: illinc pendet, 
illuc spectat ac nititur, nostris tanquam 
melior interest). By self-restraint, mo- 
deration, and patience, with regard to 
possessions, a man will be some day a 
worthy partner of the divine feast, says 
Epictetus (Enchir. xv.): ‘‘ but if you 
touch none of the dishes set before you 
and actually scorn them, τότε οὐ μόνον 
ἔσει συμπότης θεῶν ἀλλὰ καὶ συνάρχων. 

Ver. 21. δώσω κ.τιλ.ι, To share 
Christ’s royal power and judicial dignity 
is a reward proffered in the gospels, but 
Jesus there (cf. Mark x. 40) disclaimed 
this prerogative. God’s throne is Christ's, 
as in xxii. I. vuk@v=the moral purity and 
sensitiveness (cf. 18 and on ii. 7) which 
succeeds in responding to the divine ap- 
peal. The schema of God, Christ, and 
the individual Christian (cf. on ii. 27) is 
characteristically Johannine (cf. John xv. 
9 f., xvii. το f., xx. 21), though here as in 
ver. 20 (contrast John xiv. 23) the es- 
chatological emphasis makes the paral- 
lel one of diction rather than of thought. 

The scope and warmth of the promises 


4 


374 


AITIOKAAY¥IZ [QANNOY 


111. 


θρόνω μου, ὡς κἀγὼ ἐνίκησα καὶ ἐκάθισα μετὰ τοῦ πατρός μου 
ρόνῳ μου, γὼ ἐνίκη μ ρός μ 


> ~ , > Lol 

ἐν τῷ θρόνῳ αὐτοῦ. 
aA ΕῚ , ΕΣ 

ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις. 


to Laodicea seem rather out of place in 
view of the church’s poor religion, but 
here as elsewhere the prophet is writing 
as much for the’ churches in general as 
for the particular community. He speaks 
ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις. This consideration, 
together with the close sequence of 
thought in 19-21 forbids any attempt to 
delete 20, 21 as a later editorial addition 
(Wellhausen) or to regard 20 (21) as an 
epilogue to the seven letters (Vitringa, 
Alford, Ramsay) rather than as an in- 
tegral part of the Laodicean epistle. 
Such a detachment would be a gratui- 
tous breach of symmetry. But, while 
these closing sentences are not a sort of 


anticipates the following visions (iv.-v.). 
To the prophet the real value and signi- 
ficance of Christ’s life were focussed 
in his sacrificial death and in the rights 
and privileges which he secured thereby 
for those on whose behalf he had suffered 
and triumphed. This idea, already sug- 
gested in i. 5, 6, 17, 18, forms the central 
theme of the next oracle. 

The ἐκκλησίαι now pass out of sight 
till the visions are over. During the 
latter it is the ἅγιοι who are usually in 
evidence, until the collective term πόλις 
is employed in the final vision (cf. iii. 12). 
John knows nothing of any catholic 
ἐκκλησία. To him the ἐκκλησίαι are so 
many local communities who share a 
common faith and expect a common 
destiny; they are, as Kattenbusch ob- 
serves, colonies of heaven, and heaven is 
their mother-country. Partly owing to 
O.T. associations, partly perhaps on ac- 
count of the feeling that an ἐκκλησία (in 
the popular Greek sense of the term) im- 
plied a city, John eschews this term. 
He also ignores the authority of any 
officials; the religious situation depends 
upon the prophets, who are in direct 
touch with God and through whom the 
Spirit of God controls and guides the 
saints. Their words are God’s words; 
they can speak and write with an 
authority which enables them to Say, 
Thus saith the Spirit. Only, while in 
the contemporary literature of Chris- 
tianity the prophetic outlook embraces 
either the need of organisation in order 
to meet the case of churches which are 
scattered over a wide area and exposed 


22. Ὁ ἔχων οὖς ἀκουσάτω τί τὸ Πνεῦμα λέγει 


to the vagaries of unauthorised leaders 
(Pastoral Epistles and Ignatius), or con- 
tention among the office-bearers them- 
selves (a sure sign of the end, Asc. Isa. 
iii. 20 f.), John’s apocalypse stands 
severely apart from either interest. 
ΝΌΤΕ on i. 9-111. 22, We have no 
data to show whether the seven letters 
or addresses ever existed in separate 
form, or whether they were written before 
or after the rest of the visions. All evi- 
dence for such hypotheses consists of 
quasi-reasons or precarious hypotheses 
based on some a priori theory of the 
book’s composition. The great proba- 
bility is that they never had any réle of 
their own apart from this book, but were 
written for their present position. As 
the Ronran emperors addressed letters to 
the Asiatic cities or corporations (the in- 
scriptions mention at least six to Ephesus, 
seven to Pergamos, three to Smyrna, 
etc.), so Jesus, the true Lord of the 
Asiatic churches, is represented as send- 
ing communications to them (cf. Deiss- 
mann’s Licht vom Osten, pp. 274 f.). 
The dicit or λέγει with whieh the Im- 
perial messages open corresponds to the 
more biblical τάδε λέγει of ii. 1, etc. 
Each of the apocalyptic communications 
follows a fairly general scheme, although 
in the latter four the appeal for attention 
follows (instead of preceding) the mystic 
promise, while the imperative repent oc- 
curs only in the first, third, fifth, and 
seventh, the other churches receiving 
praise rather than censure. This arti- 
ficial or symmetrical arrangement, which 
may be traced in or read into other 
details, is as characteristic of the whole 
apocalypse as is the style which— when 
the difference of topic is taken into ac- 
count—cannot be said to exhibit peculi- 
arities of diction, syntax, or vocabulary 
sufficient to justify the relegation of the 
seven letters to a separate source. Even 
if written by another hand or originally 
composed as a separate piece, they must 
have been worked over so thoroughly by 
the final editor and fitted so aptly into 
the general scheme of the whole Apoca- 
lypse (cf. ¢.g. ii. 7 = xxii. 2, 14, 19; ii. 
II = xx. 163 ii. 17 = xix. 125 11.20 = xy 
43 ti. 28 = xxii. 10; 11. 5 = Vil. 9, ΤῊΝ 
ili. 5 = xiii. 8, xx, 15 3 il. [2 = xxi. Tay 
XX. 14 5 ill, 21 = iv. 4: il. 20 = mx. 98 
etc.), that it is no longer possible to dis- 


22—IV. I. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


375 


IV. 1. “META ταῦτα " εἶδον, ἢ καὶ ἰδοὺ θύρα ἠνεωγμένη ἐν τῷ α vii. τ, 9, 


οὐρανῷ, καὶ ἡ φωνὴ ἡ “πρώτη ἣν ἤκουσα ὡς σάλπιγγος ἀ λαλούσης 


ὦ xiv. 14, xix. 11, Zech. v. 9. ci. ro. 


entangle them (or their nucleus). The 
special traits in the conception of Christ 
are mainly due to the fact that the writer 
is dealing here almost exclusively with 
thejinner relation of Jesus to the churches. 
They are seldom, if ever, more realistic 
or closer to the messianic categories of 
the age than is elsewhere the case 
throughout the apocalypse; and if the 
marjoram of Judaism or (as we might 
more correctly say) of human nature is 
not wholly transmuted into the honey of 
Christian charity—which is scarcely sur- 
prising under the circumstances—yet the 
moral and mental stature of the writer 
appears when he is set beside so powerful 
a counsellor in some respects as the later 
Ignatius. Here John is at his fuil 
height. He combines moral discipline 
and moral enthusiasm in his injunctions. 
He sees the central things and urges 
them upon the churches, with a singular 
power of tenderness and sarcasm, in- 
sight and foresight, vehemence and re- 
proach, undaunted faithfulness in rebuke 
and a generous r adiness to mark what 
he thinks are the merits as well as the 
failings and perils of the communities. 
The needs of the latter appear to have 
been twofold. One, of which they were 
fully conscious, was outward. The 
other, to which they were not entirely 
alive, was inward, The former is met 
by an assurance that the stress of per- 
secution in the present and in the im- 
mediate future was under God’s control, 
unavoidable and yet endurable. The 
latter is met by the answer of discipline 
and careful correction; the demand for 
purity and loyalty in view of secret errors 
and vices is reiterated with a keen 
sagacity. In every case, the motives of 
fear, shame, noblesse oblige, and the like, 
are crowned by an appeal to spiritual am- 
bition and longing, the closing note of 
each epistle thus striking the keynote of 
what follows throughout the whole 
Apocalypse. In form, as well as in 
content, the seven letters are the most 
definitely Christian part of the book. 
The scene now changes. Christ in 
authority over his churches, and the 
churches with their angels, pass away; 
a fresh and ampler tableau of the 
vision opens (¢f. on i. 19), ushering in 
the future (vi.-xxii. 5), which—-as dis- 
closed by God through Chriat 4. 1)—is 


XV. 5, 
Xviii. 1, 
ἈΠ 1, δὲν 


i, 12. 
d Loose appos. to σ. instead of φωνή, cf. ix. 13, etc. 


prefaced by a solemn exhibition of God’s 
supremacy and Christ’s indispensable 
position in revelation. In Apoc. Bar. 
xxiv. 2 the seer is told that on the day of 
judgment he and his companions are to 
see ‘‘ the long-suffering of the Most High 
which has been throughout all genera- 
tions, who has been long-suffering to- 
wards all those born that sin and are 
righteous.” He then seeks an answer to 
the question, ‘‘ But what will happen 
to our enemies I know not, and when 
Thou wilt visit Thy works (i.¢., for judg- 
ment)” ? This is precisely the course of 
thought (first inner mercies and then 
iv. f. ; although in the former John sees 
in this life already God’s great patience 
towards his people, The prophet is 
now admitted to the heavenly conclave 
where (by an adaptation of the rabbinic 
notion) God reveals, or at least prepares, 
his purposes before executing them. 
Chapter iv. and chapter v. are counter- 
parts; in the former God the Creator, 
with his praise from heavenly beings, 
is the central figure: in the latter the 
interest is focussed upon Christ the 
redeemer, with his praise from the 
human and natural creation as well. 
Chapter v. further leads over into the 
first series of events (the seven seals, 
vi.-viil.) which herald the dénouement. 
Henceforth Jesus is represented as the 
Lamb, acting but never speaking, until 
in the epilogue (xxii. 6-21) the author 
reverts to the Christological standpoint 
of i.-iii. Neither this nor any other 
feature, however, is sufficient to prove 
that iv.-v. represent a Jewish source 
edited by a Christian; the whole piece 
is Christian and homogeneous (Sabatier, 
Schén, Bousset, Pfleiderer, Wellhausen). 
Chapter iv. is a preliminary description 
of the heavenly court: God’s ruddy 
throne with a green nimbus being sur- 
rounded by a senate of πρεσβύτεροι and 
mysterious ζῷα. Seven torches burn 
before the throne, beside a crystal ocean, 
while from it issue flashes and peals ac- 
companied by a ceaseless liturgy of 
adoration from the πρεσβύτεροι and the 
{¢a, who worship with a rhythmic emo- 
tion of awe. 

CuapTER IV.—Ver. 1. pera. . . ἰδού 
introducing as usual in an independent 
clause (instead of a simple accus., Vit. ii. 


376 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


ἵν. 


eCf.1Kings μετ᾽ ἐμοῦ, λέγων, ““᾿Ανάβα ὧδε, καὶ δείξω σοι ἃ δεῖ γενέσθαι pere 


XXii. 19. era 
f(Oflocal TauTa . 
position 

=“stood”) 
Jer. xxiv. 
I, Jo. xix. 
29, etc. 

g Used in ne 
Apoc. with gen., dat., and acc. indifferently. 


2. εὐθέως ἐγενόμην ἐν πνεύματι " 


καὶ ἰδοὺ ° θρόνος * ἔκειτο ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ, 
καὶ © ἐπὶ τὸν θρόνον " καθήμενος ᾿" 


1The λεγουσα of HCP, τ, 92 marge, Areth., etc. is a correction of orig. Aeyov 


be* AQ, etc., Ande, edd. [an awkward constr. ad sensum = ἌΝ 


8 f., 31, 173, 174, to which he reverts in 
ver. 4) some fresh and weighty revelation ; 
lesser phases are heralded by the simpler 
καὶ εἶδον. The phrase indicates a pause, 
which of course may have covered days as 
well as hours in the original experience of 
the seer, if we assume that his visions came 
in the order in which they are recorded, 
He is no longer in the island but up at the 
gatesofheaven. Inhis trance, a heavenly 
voice comes after he has seen—not 
heaven opened (the usual apocalyptic 
and ecstatic symbol, e.g. Acts x. 1l1=a 
vision, xi. 5, Ezek. i. 1, Matt. iii. 16, Ap. 
Bar. xxii. 1) but—a door set open (ready, 
opened) in the vault of the mysterious 
upper world which formed God’s house. 
Then follows the rapture (which in i. 9 
precedes the voice). The whole vision is 
composed by a man familiar with O.T. 
prophecy, in Semitic style: short clauses 
linked by the monotonous καί, with little 
or no attempt made at elaboration of any 
kind. Traits from the theophany of God 
as a monarch, surrounded by a triple 
circle (cf. the triple circle surrounding 
Ahuramazda), are blended with traits 
drawn from the theophany in nature. 
The ordinary Jewish conception (Gfrérer, 
i. 365 f.) tended to regard God as the 
royal priest, to whom angels rendered 
ceaseless levitical praise and service (cf. 
Apoc. iv.-v.), or as a glorified rabbi whose 
angels act as interpreters of the heavenly 
mysteries for man (cf. Apoc. x. and 
apocalyptic literature in general with its 
angelic cicerones). In the seven heavens 
of Chagiga, 12b, the third is the place 
where “the millstones grind manna for 
the righteous” (Ps. Ixxviii. 23, 24, cf. 
Apoc. ii. 17), whilst in the fourth are the 
heavenly Jerusalem (cf. Apoc. xxi. 10) 
and the temple (Apoc. xv. 5 f.) and the 
altar (Apoc. viii. 3 f.) where the great 
prince Michael offers an offering, but in 
the fifth the ministering angels, who sing 
God’s praise by night, are silent by day 
to let Israel’s adoration rise to the Most 
High (see on ver. 8). avaBa ὧδε (cf. 


; of. Vit. i. 204 ἢ]. 


the common phrase, ἀναβαίνειν εἰς τὸν 
οὐρανόν, of penetration into heavenly 
mysteries), from Exod. xix. 16, 24, φωνὴ 
τῆς σάλπιγγος ἤχει μέγα. . εἶπεν δὲ 
αὐτῷ Κύριος . .. ἀνάβηθι. As in the 
O.T. the revelation is vouchsafed spon- 
taneously, whereas in Iranian theology 
(é.g-, in the Vendidad) ‘‘it is the wish of 
man, not the will of God, that is the 
first cause of the revelation” (Darmes- 
teter, 5. B. E. iv. p. Ixxxv.). The seer 
does not enter the door till he is 
called; to know the divine will is the 
outcome of revelation, not of inquiry 
or speculative curiosity (similar idea in 
I Cor. ii. 9 f.). Enoch (xiv. gf.) also does. 
not enter the palace of God with its fire- 
encircled walls, but sees through the 
open portals “a high throne, καὶ τὸ εἶδος. 
αὐτοῦ ὡσεὶ κρυστάλλινον . .. καὶ ὄρος 
χερουβίν . . . and from underneath the 
great throne came streams of flaming 
fire so that I could not look thereon. 
And the great Glory sat thereon and his 
raiment shone more brightly than the 
sun and was whiter than any snow.”” He 
is finally called by God to approach but 
not to enter. Cf. Ap. Bar. li. 11, Test. 
Levi. v, ‘and the angel opened unto me 
the gates of heaven, and 1 saw the holy 
One, the Most High, seated on the 
throne”. 

Ver. 2. A fresh wave of ecstasy 
catches up the seer. εὐθέως . . πνεύματι, 
repeating i. 10, not because the author 
had forgotten his previous statement, 
and still less because anew source begins 
here (Vischer), but simply because every 
successive phase of this Spirit-conscious- 
ness, every new access of ecstasy, was. 
considered to be the result of a fresh in- 
spiration; so the O.T. prophets (e.g., 
Ezek. xi. I καὶ ἀνέλαβέν pe πνεῦμα 
k.t.A., followed by ver. 5 καὶ ἔπεσεν ἐπ᾽ 
ἐμὲ πνεῦμα, ii. 2 and iii. 24; cf. Enoch 
xiv. 9 Kal ἄνεμοι ἐν TH ὁράσει pov... 
εἰσήνεγκάν pe eis τὸν οὐρανόν followed’ 
by ver. 14 ἐθεώρουν ἐν τ. 6. p. Kal ἰδοὺ. 
«.T.A., Ixxi. t απά 5, etc.). The primitive. 


2—3. 


3: Kal ὁ καθήμενος ὅμοιος * ὁράσει λίθῳ ' ἰάσπιδι καὶ " σαρδίῳ " 
™ ὅμοιος ὁράσει σμαραγδίνῳ. 


καὶ 'Tpis ' κυκλόθεν τοῦ θρόνου 


k xxi. 20, Exod. xxviii. 20, xxxix. 13, Ezek. xxviii. 
m Cf. Win. ὃ 11,1. 


also it is substituted for τόξον of LXX. 


Christian conception of the Spirit was 
that of a ,sudden and repeated trans- 
port rather than a continuous experience 
(Acts iv. 8, 31, etc.), particularly in the 
region of ecstasy. The royal presence is 
depicted in this theophany by means of 
similes and metaphors (partly rabbinic) 
which originally were suggested in part 
by the marvellous atmospheric colouring 
of an Eastern sky during storm or sunset ; 
several had been for long traditional and 
fanciful modes of expressing the divine 
transcendence (e.g., En. xiv. 18 f. the 
divine glory like crystal, etc.) which 
dominates the Apocalypse. God is a 
silent, enthroned (cf. 1 Kings xxii. 19 
etc.), eternal Figure, hidden by the very 
excess of light, keeping ward and watch 
over his people, but never directly inter- 
fering in their affairs till the judgment, 
when mankind appears before his throne 
for doom and recompense. This reluct- 
ance to name or describe God, so char- 
acteristic of the later Judaism, was allied 
to the feeling which mediated his action 
upon the world through angels or through 
his Christ (see oni. 1 and xv. 8). For 
the tendency to describe God and heaven 
in priestly terms, cf. Gfrérer, i. 276 f. 
The whole of the present passage is illus- 
trated by Pirke Elieser, iv.: ‘‘majestas 
sancti benedicti est in medio quattuor 
classium angelicarum. Ipse _ insidet 
throno excelso eleuatus, atque solium 
eius sublime suspensum est sursum in 
aere, figura autem gloriae eius est sicut 
color Chasonal, juxta uerba prophetiae 
(Ezek. i. 27) . . . atque oculi per totum 
orbem discurrunt. Sagittae eius sunt 
ignis et grando ; a dextra eius uita est, 
a sinistra mors, sceptrum ignitum in manu 
eius. Expansum est ante eum uelum., et 
septem angeli qui prius creati sunt, famu- 
lantur ei ante uelum .. . infra thronum 
gloriae eius est sicuti lapis sapphiri.” 
Ver. 3. The sources of the general 
conception lie far back in passages like 
Isa. vi. 1 f., Ezek. i. 26 f., Dan. vii. g f., 
Enoch xxxix., xl., xlvi., mediated by rab- 
binical interpretations. But it should 
be noted that in the palace-temple of 
Hatra, the Parthian capital, one well- 
known frieze contained a row of figures 
including the griffin, the eagle, the 
human face, the head of an ox, and an 
emblem on the cornice apparently repre- 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


“17 


h “In ap- 
pear- 
ance,” 

i Cf. on xxi. 


Il. 
20. 1 Ezek. i. 28, ἄπ. λεγ. N.T., cf. x. r,where 


senting the sun. With a sublime re- 
straint, the author leaves the royal pre- 
sence undefined, though he is more defi- 
nite and explicit on the whole than (say) 
Ezekiel. The latter’s advance in this 
respect upon his predecessors was ex- 
plained by the rabbis (cf. Streane’s Cha- 
giga, p. 73) as a needful counteractive to 
the Jewish belief that visions were im- 
possible outside Canaan, and as a help 
to men of the captivity who needed 
‘special details to support them in their 
trials” (cf. above, i.g f.). The σάρδιον, 
a flesh-coloured, semi-transparent, often 
golden or ruddy gem, answers to our 
red jasper or cornelian, so-called perhaps 
from Sardis, whence the stone was origi- 
nally exported. ὅμοιος, adj. only here 
with two terminations. ‘The striking 
simile Sp. 6p. A. i. x. o. recalls the por- 
trait statues of Roman emperors and 
others, in which the raiment is worked 
out in hard-coloured stones—a fashion 
introduced in the last years of the re- 
public from Ptolemaic Egypt” (Myres, 
E. Bi., 4812).—lpus. The nimbus or 
halo round the throne is green, op. (cf. 
Deissm, 267) being malachite or more 
probably an emerald (xxi. 19), to which 
the ancients attributed a talismanic 
power of warding off evil spirits. “Thou 
hast made heaven and earth bright with 
thy rays of pure emerald light” (hymn 
to Ra, E. B. D. 8). The rabbis (Cha- 
giga, 16 a) discouraged any study of the 
rainbow, as it symbolised the glory of 
God. As the symbol of God’s covenant, 
it may be here a foil to the forbidding 
awe of ver. 5 a (which develops 3 a, as 
5 ὃ develops 3 6-4); ‘‘ Deus in judiciis 
semper meminit foederis sui” (Grotius.) 
But, like the parabolic details of Jesus, 
these traits are mainly descriptive. The 
association of jasper, sardius, and emerald 
isa genuinely Hellenic touch: cf. Phaedo, 
110, where Plato describes the real earth 
under the heavens of paradise as a place 
where in perfection lie such things as 
exist here but in fragmentary beauty— 
for example, the pebbles esteemed here, 
σάρδιά τε καὶ ἰάσπιδας καὶ cpapdy- 
δους. Flinders Petrie, taking op. as 
rock-crystal, argues that the rainbow 
here is of the prismatic colour which a 
hexagonal prism of that colourless stone 
would throw (Hastings, D. B. iv. 620). 


378 


n Sc. εἶδον 
from ἰδού. 

o On the 
forms 
τεσσερ. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


IV. 


4. Καὶ κυκλόθεν τοῦ θρόνου 1 " θρόνους εἴκοσι ° τέσσαρας - 
καὶ ἐπὶ τοὺς θρόνους εἴκοσι τέσσαρας πρεσβυτέρους καθημένους, 
περιβεβλημένους ἐν ἱματίοις λευκοῖς * 
καὶ ἐπὶ τὰς κεφαλὰς αὐτῶν Ῥ στεφάνους χρυσοῦς. 


206. 
p Sap. v. 15-16, 2 Macc. xiv. 4, cf. Jos. Ant., iii. 7, 7. 


1@povor (PQ, etc., Areth., Bg., Al. Bs.) after Opovov seems a correction of (ana- 
coluthon) θρονους SA, 34, 35, Andc, etc. (Lach., Ti., WH marg., Bj., Sw., Ws.). 


Ver. 4. This verse breaks the continu- 
ous description of 3 and 5 ; it is evidently 
an original touch of the writer intro- 
duced into the more or less traditional 
scenery of the eternal court where ‘‘all 
the sanctities of heaven stood thick as 
stars” (cf. v. 11). The conception of 
twenty-four πρεσβύτεροι royally (i. 6) 
enthroned as divine assessors, with all 
the insignia of state, reaches back in 
part to a post-exilic apocalypse (Isa. 
xxiv. 23, βασιλεύσει κύριος ἐν Σιὼν καὶ 
εἰς Ἱερουσαλὴμ καὶ ἐνώπιον τῶν πρεσ- 
βυτέρων δοξασθήσεται), in part to the 
historic gerousia. But their attire (golden 
crowns, white robes) and functions are 
royal rather than judicial or sacerdotal. 
They are heavenly beings, angelic figures 
corresponding to the θρόνοι of Col. i. 16 
(cf. Isa. Ixiii. 9 οὐ πρεσβὺς οὐδὲ ἄγγελος). 
The significance of the doubled 12 has 
been found in the twelve patriarchs or 
tribes + the twelve apostles (Andr., Areth., 
Vict., Alford, Weiss, etc.), in Jewish and 
Gentile Christianity (Bleek, de Wette, 
Weizsacker, Swete), or in the twenty- 
four classes of the post-exilic priests with 
their “elders” (Schiirer, H. F. P. i. 216 
f., so from Vitringa to Ewald, Hilg., 
Renan, Spitta, Wellh., Erbes, Briggs). 
But the notion of the church as a fusion 
or combination of the old and the new 
covenants is alien to primitive Christian- 
ity, and the “elders” are not the ideal 
or celestial representatives of the church 
at all. They pertain to the heavenly 
court, as in the traditional mise-en-scéne 
of the later Judaism, which had appro- 
priated this and other imaginative sugges- 
tions of the heavenly court (Schrader,°® 
pp. 454 f.), or judicial council from 
the Babylonian astro-theology, where 
μετὰ τὸν ζῳδιακὸν κύκλον were ranged 
four-and-twenty stars, half to the north, 
and half to the south, of which the 
visible are reckoned as belonging to 
the living, the invisible to the dead, 
ots δικαστὰξ: τῶν ὅλων προσαγο- 
ρεύουσιν (Diod. Sic. ii. 31, quoted by 


Gunkel in S. C. 302-308, who rightly 
finds in the same soil roots of other 
symbols in this passage, such as the four 
{oa and the seven λαμπάδες). In Slav. 
En. iv. 1, immediately after “the very 
great sea’’ in the first heaven is men- 
tioned (cf. Apoc. iv. 6), Enoch is shown 
“the elders and the rulers of the orders 
of the stars;”’ so in ¥udicium Petri, 
εἴκοσι yap Kal τέσσαρές εἰσι πρεσβύ- 
τεροι, twelve on the right hand of God 
and twelve on the left, as in Acta Perpet. 
The twenty-four star-deities of the Baby- 
lonian heaven had thus become adoring 
and subordinate angelic beings (cf. ἡμῶν, 
ver. II) in the apocalyptic world of the 
later Judaism, and our author retains 
this Oriental trait, together with the 
seven torches, the halo, etc., in order to 
body forth poetically his conception 
of the divine majesty (so, after Gunkel, 
Jeremias, and Bousset, Bruston, J. 
Weiss, Scott, Forbes, Porter). A partial 
anticipation of this feature, as well as of 
some others, in the Apocalypse occurs 
not only in the ‘sacred council” of 
Doushara, the Nabatean deity (cf. Cook's 
North Semit. Inscr., pp. 221 f., 443 f.), 
but in Egyptian mythology, as, ¢.g., in 
the following inscription from the tomb 
of Unas (5th dynasty, 3500 B.c.) ‘‘ His 
place is at the side of God, in the most 
holy place ; he himself becomes divine 
(neter), and an angel of God; he himself 
is triumphant. He sits on the great 
throne by the side of God [Apoc. iii. 21]. 
He is clothed with the finest raiment of 
those who sit on the throne of living 
right and truth. He hungers not, nor 
thirsts, nor is sad, for he eats daily the 
bread of Ra, and drinks what He drinks 
daily, and his bread also is that which is 
spoken of by Seb, and that which comes 
forth from the mouth of the gods [Apoc. 
vii. 16, 17, xxi. 4]. Not only does he eat 
and drink of their food, but he wears 
the apparel they wear—the white linen 
and sandals, and he is clothed in white 
... and these great and never-failing 





4—6. ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


379 


A - 
5. Καὶ “ἐκ τοῦ θρόνου ἐκπορεύονται ἀστραπαὶ καὶ φωναὶ Kala Ps. xvii. 


He 14, Xxix. 
« βρονταί Jub. ii. 1, 
A δ ΤΊ. 4,12,16, 
καὶ " ἑπτὰ "λαμπάδες πυρὸς καιόμεναι ἐνώπιον τοῦ θρόνου [ἃ iii τ, ν.6, 
5 1 a , A a cf. Ap. 
εἰσιν τὰ ἑπτὰ πνεύματα τοῦ θεοῦ]. Bar. 
ᾷ Ξ xl viii. 8, 
6. καὶ 2 ἐνώπιον τοῦ θρόνου ὡς "θάλασσα ‘badivy, ὁμοία κρυσ- and Slav. 
En. χῖχ. 6. 
τάλλῳ. 8 XV. 2. 
a a és Exod. 
Καὶ ἐν μέσῳ τοῦ θρόνου καὶ κύκλῳ τοῦ θρόνου τέσσερα toa aan 10f., 
Ezek. i. 


22f., ἄπ. Aey. N.T, 


1Either a εἰσιν (ΟΡ, 1, 36, 94, Syr., Ti., WH, Sw., Bj.) or a ἐστιν (A, Lach., 
Ws., Bs.) is to be read for at evowv (Q, etc., S., Areth.). 


3 K6nnecke (Emendationen zu Stellen N.T., 34) and Bs. (?) om. καὶ κυκλω του 
θρονου as a gloss (so min., Me., Harl., Arm., Tic.), while Bruston takes καὶ ev 


μεσω Tov θρονου as the mistranslation of Ὁ al) (= and the throne was 


in the midst of it, #.¢., of the glassy sea). For τεσσαρα here and in ver. 8 read 
τεσσερα (A, edd.), as generally throughout Apoc. (a kowwy-form, possibly Ionian: 
Helbing, 5-6, Thumb, 72), though ‘‘the papyri would seem to supply decisive evi- 
dence for τεσσαρα as the first century form” (Class. Review, 1901, p. 33, cf. 1904, 


Ρ- 107). 


gods give unto him of the Tree of Life 
[Apoc. ii. 7] of which they themselves do 
eat, that he likewise may live.” 

Ver. 5. The impression of awe is 
heightened by traits from the primitive 
Semitic theophany which, especially in 
judgment, was commonly associated with 
a thunderstorm (@wvat=the shrieks and 
roaring blasts of the storm). Thunder in 
the Apocalypse is either a sort of chorus 
in praise of God (as here) or punitive 
(e.g., xvi. 18); in Enoch lix. 1 the seer 
beholds the secrets of the thunder, ‘‘ how 
it ministers unto well-being and blessing, 
or serves for a curse before the Lord of 
Spirits”. For the ‘‘torches of fire” 
(seven being a sacred number =collective 
and manifold power, Jastrow 265, Trench 
62-70) cf. Ezek. i. 13 ὡς ὄψις λαμπάδων 
συστρεφομένων ἀναμέσον τῶν ζῴων καὶ 
φέγγος τοῦ πυρὸς καὶ ἐκ τοῦ πυρὸς 
ἐξεπορεύετο ἀστραπή, and Apoc. Bar. 
xxi. 6, where ‘‘holy living creatures, 
without number, of flame and fire” sur- 
round the throne. Fulness, intensity, 
energy, are implied in the figure, which 
reflects the traditional association (in 
the primitive mind) of fire and flame 
with the divinity, and especially with 
the divine purity or holiness of which 
they were regarded as an outward ex- 
pression. There may be an allusion 
to the ignes aeterni or sempiterni of 
Roman mythology, an equivalent for the 
heavenly bodies; but Jewish eschato- 
logy had for over two centuries been 
familiar with the seven watchers of the 
heavenly court and their counterparts in 


Persian and Babylonian mythology. The 
combination of fire and crystal (ver. 6, see 
also xv. 2) goes back originally to Exod. 
xxiv. 9, 10, 17, and Ezek. i. 22, 27, medi- 
ated by passages like En. xiv. 9, 17 f., 
21-23; while the groundwork of the symbol 
answers to the seven Persian councillors 
(Ezra vii. 14, Esth. i. 14) who formed 
the immediate circle of the monarch, a 
counterpart of the divine Amshaspands, 
as well as to the sacred fire of Ormuzd, 
which (on Zoroastrian principles) was 
to be kept constantly burning. Seven 
burning altars, evidently representing a 
planetary symbolism, also occur in the 
cult of Mithra, while in the imageless 
temple of Melcarth at Gades fires always 
burned upon the altar, tended by white- 
robed priests.—5 ¢ reads like an editorial 
comment or a liturgical gloss; the 
πρεσβύτεροι, ¢.g., are undefined. 

Ver. 6. For a sea in heaven, cf. above 
(on ver. 4). In Test. Patr. Levi. 2 the 
sea lies within the second (first) heaven 
ὕδωρ κρεμάμενον ἀνάμεσον τούτου Ka- 
κείνου, and in the Egyptian paradise the 
triumphant soul goes to ‘“‘the great lake 
in the Fields of Peace,” where the gods 
dwell. The description, “ἃ sea of glass, 
like crystal” (i.e., transparent, ancient 
glass being coarse and often semi-opaque, 
and ὕαλος being primarily=transparent, 
not vitreous) borrowed partly from archaic 
tradition (coloured by Egyptian and As- 
syrian ideas), is intended to portray the 
ether, clear and calm, shimmering and 
motionless. Rabbinic fancy compared 
the shining floor of the temple to crystal, 


lr 


580 ATIOKAAYVIS IQANNOY 

ἃ From “yéuovta ὀφθαλμῶν ἔμπροσθεν καὶ ὄπισθεν. 7. καὶ τὸ ἕῷον τὸ 
τας i πρῶτον ὅμοιον λέοντι, καὶ τὸ δεύτερον ζῷον ὅμοιον * μόσχῳ, Kat TO 

ν um. 


xxiii. 22, τρίτον ζῷον ἔχων τὸ πρόσωπον ὡς ἀνθρώπου, καὶ τὸ τέταρτον ζῷον 


xxiv.8 4 ΑΥΤΟΝ Ε 
w “apiece” ομοιον αεέτῳ πετομενῷ.- 
(distribut. ,, 


8. καὶ τὰ τέσσερα Loa, ἕν καθ᾽ ἕν αὐτῶν 
ἔχων ἥ ἀνὰ πτέρυγας ἕξ, κυκλόθεν Kat ἔσωθεν γέμουσιν ὀφθαλμῶν, 


A 
x Isa. vi. 3, καὶ * ἀνάπαυσιν " οὐκ ἔχουσιν ἡμέρας καὶ νυκτὸς λέγοντες, 


cf. Slav. 
En. xi. 2, 
σις τς 
y Notin 
Isa. vi. 3 ᾿ 
(LXX), οἵ. οἱ 1. 8. 


“ἥλγιος ἅγιος ἅγιος Κύριος 6 Θεὸς 6 7 παντοκράτωρ, 
Secs Ae: 88 ‘ee ee | , ” 
ὃ ἣν καὶ 6 ὧν καὶ ὁ ἐρχόμενος. 


1 ΤῸ 15. arbitrary to omit (Wellh.) κυκλόθεν. . . οφθαλμων, and the variant addi- 
tion (kat εξωθεν, Q, Pr., etc.) after κυκλοθεν is an attempt to smooth out the phrase 


and the hot eastern sky is likened (in Job 
xxxvii. 18) to a molten mirror, dry and bur- 
nished. Heaven is a sort of glorified 
temple (1 Kings vii. 23, the sea in the 
Solomonic temple being copied from the 
oblong or round tank which represented 
the ocean at every Babylonian temple, 
while the earth was symbolised by the 
adjoining zikkurat), and the crystal fir- 
mament is a sort of sea. In Slav. En. 
iii. 1-3 the seer observes, in the first 
heaven, the ether, and then ‘‘a very 
great sea, greater than the earthly sea”. 
καὶ ἐν μέσῳ, k.T.A. : ‘and in the middle 
(of each side) of the throne and (conse- 
quently) round about the throne,” the 


four SVT of Ezek. i. 5, 18 (of. Apoc. 


Bar. li. 11). γέμοντα κ.τ.λ., a bizarre but 
archaic symbol for completeness of life 
and intelligence rather than for Argus- 
like vigilance. The four angels of the 
presence in En. xl. 2 move out, like 
Milton’s seven (Par. Lost, iii. 647 f.), on 
various errands (Ixxi. 9, cf. Ixxxviii. 2, 3). 
The {6a of John are stationary, except in 
xv. 7, where the context (cf. vi..6) might 
suggest that the seer took them to repre- 
sent creation or the forces of the natural 
world (cf. the rabbinic dictum: quattuor 
sunt qui principatum in hoc mundo ten- 
ent, inter creaturas homo, inter aues 
aquilo, inter pecora bos, inter bestias leo). 
Note also that when they worship (9), the 
πρεσβύτεροι acknowledge God’s creative 
glory (11), and that the O.T. cherubim 
are associated with the phenomena of the 
storm-cloud. The seer does not define 
them, however, and they may be, like the 
πρεσβύτεροι, a traditional and poetical 
trait of the heavenly court.—réooepa, cf. 
Slav. En, xxx. 13,14. The posture of the 
ζῷα may be visualised from a comparison 
of the Alhambra Court of the Lions. 


Ver, 7. μόσχῳ, “an ox or steer ”’ (as 


LXX). The four animals are freely 
compounded out of the classical figures 
of Ezekiel’s cherubim and the seraphim 
in Isa, vi.; the latter supply the six 
wings apiece. This function of cease- 
less praise (8-9) is taken from Enoch 
Ixi. το ἢ, where the cherubim and 
seraphim are also associated but not 
identified with the angelic host (though 
in xl. the cherubim are equivalent to the 
four archangels); for a possible Baby- 
lonian astral background, cf. Zimmern 
in Schrader,® 626-632, and Clemen’s Re- 
ligtonsgeschichtliche Erkladrung des N. 
T. (1909), pp. 74 f. Behind them lie the 
signs of the zodiac (the bull, the archer, 
the lion and the eagle, as a constellation 
of the North ; so, e.g., Gunkel, | Bruston, 
etc.). The analogous figures of the four 
funerary genii before the Egyptian throne 
represent the four points of the compass. 

Ver. 8. A description of the sounds 
and songs of heaven follows the picture 
of its sights.—yépovowy, either with τὰ 
τ.ἵ. (Exwv for once a real participle) or an 
asyndeton (if ἔχων here, as elsewhere in 
the Apocalypse, must be supplied with a 
copula), κυκλ. K. é = “round their 
bodies and on the inside” (i,e., under- 
neath their wings). For the ceaseless 
praise, which resembles that of Nin-ib, 
the Assyrian deity, cf. on ver. 7 and ver. 
11, also Enoch xxxix, 12 (the trisagion 
sung by the sleepless ones, #.e., angels), 
Slav, En. xvii., and Test. Levi 3 (where 
endless praise is the function of denizens 
in the fourth heaven). The first line of 
the hymn is Isaianic, the second (6 ἦν 
k.T.A.) is characteristic of the Apocalypse. 
In En. xli. 7 the sun and moon in their 
orbits ‘‘ give thanks and praise and rest 
not; for to them their thanksgiving is 
rest”. In the Apocalypse, however, the 
phenomena of nature are generally the 
objects or the scourges of the divine 


AILOKAAY¥VIZ IQANNOY 


q—tii. 38 I 
9. καὶ ὅταν "δώσουσι ' τὰ Loa δόξαν καὶ " τιμὴν καὶ ” εὐχαριστίαν z C/. Μοαὶν 
1. 105, 


“- θ , a. & ~ θ , ~ ¢c ~ > 4 JA fal ie oes 
τῷ καθημένῳ ἐπὶ τῷ θρόνῳ, τῷ “ ζῶντι εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων» a Ps. xxviii. 
(xxix.) 1, 


10. “megobvrat οἱ εἴκοσι τέσσαρες *mpecBUTepor ἐνώπιον τοῦ καθη- 3 Tim. i, 
ψένου ἐπὶ τοῦ θρόνου, καὶ προσκυνήσουσιν τῷ ζῶντι εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας enter 
τῶν αἰώνων, καὶ " βαλοῦσιν τοὺς στεφάνους αὐτῶν ἐνώπιον τοῦ θρόνου, Foe Lost, 
λέγοντες, vil Got 
11. ““Ἄξιος εἶ, ὃ *KUptos καὶ ὁ θεὸς ἡμῶν, " λαβεῖν τὴν δύξαν © vil 22. 
καὶ Thy τιμὴν καὶ Thy δύναμιν " Be ais 


2 Chron. vii. 3. 4 
Dio Cass. xxxvi., Cicero’s pro Sextio, 27. 
3, xvi. 7), Abbott, Diat. 2681, Helbing, 34. 


1For δωσουσι AP, min., Anda (edd.), δωσωσι (δ 30, min., 
172] and δωσι (min., S., Andc, Areth.) are variants (Pr. 


TOV αἰῶνα. 


ἂν. 14, cf. 


e Verg. Georg. iv. 212, Mart. x. 72, Tiridates in Tac. Ann. xv. 29, Tigranes in 
f Nom. practically = vocative 
g v. 12, ο΄. 1 Chron. xxix. 11. 


(contrast xi. 17, xv 


Bs.) [cf WH, app. 


cum dederant, vg. cum 


-darent); cf. Win. ὃ 14,9; § 13, 7—the former being an unusual Conj. aor. 


wrath. The precedence of 6 ἦν over ὁ 
ὧν may be due to the emphasis of the con- 
text upon (ver. 11) the definite creative 
action of God. Since the πρεσβύτεροι 
worship God as the eternal (ver. 10), 
while the ζῷα acknowledge him as the 
"ἅγιος, the latter epithet probably retains 
its O.T. sense, 1.¢., absolute life and 
‘majestic power (xvi. 5). The trisagion 
occurs in the Babylonian recension (iii.) 
‘of the Shmone-Esreh, among the daily 
prayers of the Jewish community. See 
further Encycl. Rel. and Ethics, i. 117, 
118. 

Ver.9. The frequentative meaning of 
"δώσουσι comes irom the sénse rather 
than from the grammar of the passage. 
“Whenever,” etc. (t.¢., throughout the 
course of this book, v. 8 f., xi. 16 f., xix. 
4) is ‘‘a sort of stage-direction ” (Simcox). 
It would be harsh to take the words as a 
proleptic allusion to the single occur- 
rence at xi. 15 f. (J. Weiss). To give or 
-ascribe δόξα to God is reverently to ac- 
knowledge his supreme authority, either 
‘spontaneously and gladly (as here and 
xix. 7, where ‘‘ honour” becomes almost 
κε praise ”) or under stress of punishment 
(xi. 13, xiv. 7, xvi. 9) and fear of judg- 
ment. The addition of τιμή in doxo- 
logies amplifies the idea, by slightly 
“emphasising the expression of that vene- 
ration and awe felt inwardly by those 
who recognise his δόξα. To fear God 
-or to be his servants is thus equivalent 
upon the part of men to an attitude of 
pious submission and homage. To “ give 
‘thanks ” is hardly co-ordinate with 8.«.7., 
but follows from it as a corollary (cf. Pss. 
XCvi.-xcviii.). Such worship is the due 
of the living God (vii. 2, x. 6, xv. 7), 


whereas to eat “‘ meat sacrificed to idols 
is to worship dead gods” (Did. vi. Scere 
Apoc. 11. 14, 20). The Apocalypse, how- 
ever, never dwells on the danger of idolatry 
within the Christian church; its attention 
is almost absorbed by the supreme ido- 
latry of the Emperor, which is silently 
contrasted in this and in other passages 
with the genuine Imperial worship οἱ the 
Christian church. ‘He who sits on the 
throne” (a title of Osiris in E. B. D.) is the 
only true recipient of worship. Cf. the 
hymn to “ Ra when he riseth ”: “Those 
who are in thy following sing unto thee 
with joy and bow down their foreheads to 
the earth when they meet thee, thou 
lord of heaven and earth, thou king of 


Right and Truth, thou creator ot 
eternity”. 
Ver. 10, To cast a crown before the 


throne was a token that the wearer dis- 
claimed independence ; an Oriental (Par- 
thian) token of respect for royalty (reff.). 
Cf. Spenser’s Hymne of Heavenly Beautie 
(141-154) and the pretty fancy in Slav. 
En. xiv. 2 where the sun’s crown is 
taken from him as he passes through 
the fourth heaven (before God) and given 
to God. 

Ver. 11. An implicit refutation of the 
dualistic idea, developed by Cerinthus, 
the traditional opponent of John in Asia 
Minor, that creation was the work of 
some angel or power separate from God 
(Iren. i. 26, iv. 32, Hippol. Haer. vii. 33, 
x. I). The enthusiastic assent of the 
πρεσβύτεροι to the adoration of the 
Creator is expressed in word as well as 
in action. σύ emphatic=the usual apo- 
calyptic (R.J., 295, 296) emphasis on 
creation as a proof of God’s power ip 


382 


h Cf. 4 Esd. ὅτι 
vi. 6, and 
on x. 6 
below. 

i Constr. cf. 
Ril. Lz, 
John vi. 
57, XV. 3 
(dat. in- 
s{rum.). 


WOK: 
βιβλίον 


axx.t. 


ATIOKAAYYVIZ ITQANNOY 


» σὺ ἔκτισας τὰ πάντα, 

καὶ ᾿ διὰ τὸ θέλημά σου ἦσαν ' καὶ ἐκτίσθησαν.᾿᾿ 

Καὶ εἶδον " ἐπὶ τὴν δεξιὰν τοῦ καθημένου ἐπὶ τοῦ θρόνου: 
, ἔσθ ἢ θ 2 »b , 

γεγραμμένον ἔσωθεν καὶ ὄπισθεν,2 ἢ κατεσφραγισμένον᾽ 


b am. λεγ. N.T., cf. Dan. viii. 26, xii. 4, 9 (Isa. xxix. 11). 


Louk ἡσαν Q, 14, 38, 51, “‘created out of nothingness”: A om. και ἐκτίσθησαν, 
Pr., 36 om. noav και. For similar instances of the elision or addition of a negative, 
see Nestle’s Einf., 250-251 (E. Tr., 311-312). 

2 The strongly supported variant εξωθεν (PQ, min., S., gig., vg., Arm., Aeth., 
Hipp., Pr., etc., so Bousset) for οπισθεν (KA, 1, 14, Syr.) hardly alters the general 
sense of the passage, and is probably conformed to eowQev, cf. Zahn’s Einl., § 72, 7. 


providence and claims on mankind (e.g. 
4 Esd. iii. 4, ‘‘thou didst fashion the 
earth, and that thyself alone’’). That 
God the redeemer is God the creator, 
forms one of the O.T. ideas which acquire 
special weight in the Apocalypse. De- 
spite the contradictions of experience 
and the apparent triumph of Satan, the 
apocalypses of the age never gave way 
to dualism. Their firm hope was that 
the world, ideally God’s, would become 
actually his when messiah’s work was 
done; hence, as here, the assertion of 
his complete power over nature and 
nations. ‘‘ Because thou didst will it (σύ, 
gov emphatic) they existed and were 
created” (act and process of creation). 
As an answer to polytheism this cardinal 
belief in God the creator came presently 
to the front in the second century creeds 
and apologies. But the idea here is 
different alike from contemporary Jewish 
and from subsequent Christian specula- 
tion, the former holding that creation 
was for the sake of Israel (cf. 4 Esd. vi. 
55, vii. 11 ix. 13, Apoc. Bar. iv. 18, 
19, xv. 7, Ass. Mos, i. 12, etc., a favourite 
rabbinic belief), the latter convinced that 
it was for the sake of the Christian church 
(cf. Herm. Vis. ii. 4). Nor is there any 
evident trace of the finer idea (En. iii.-v , 
Clem. Rom. xx., etc.) which contrasted 
the irregularities and impiety of men with 
the order and obedience of the universe. 
The conception of the holy ones rendering 
ceaseless praise in heaven would be 
familiar to early Christians in touch 
with Hellenic ideas and associations; 
e.g., Hekataeus of Abdera, in his sketch 
of the ideal pious folk, compares them to 
the priests of Apollo, διὰ τὸ τὸν θεὸν 
τοῦτον καθ᾽ ἡμέραν ὑπ᾽ αὐτῶν ὑμνεῖσθαι 
μετ᾽ ὠδῆς συνεχῶς (Dieterich 36 f., cf. 
Apoc. Pet. 19-20). Test. Levi 3 ἐν δὲ 
τῷ pet’ αὐτόν εἰσι θρόνοι κ. ἐξουσίαι ἐν ᾧ 
ὕμνοι ἀεὶ τῷ θεῷ προσφέρονται. 


CuapTER V.—Ver. 1. The central 
idea of this sealed roll or doomsday 
book lying open on the divine hand (c/. 
Blau, Studien zur alt-heb. Buchwesen, 
36 f., E. J. Goodspeed, Fourn. Bibl. 
Lit. 1903, 70-74) is reproduced from 
Ezekiel (ii. 9 f.) but independently deve- 
loped in order to depict the truth that 
even these magnificent angelic figures of 
the divine court are unequal to the task 
ofrevelation. Jesusisneeded. For God, 
a motionless, silent, majestic figure, does 
not come directly into touch with men 
either in revelation or in providence. 
He operates through his messiah, whose 
vicarious sacrifice throws all angels into: 
the shade (cf. the thought of Phil. ii. 5- 
11). For the ancient association of a 
many-horned Lamb with divination, cf. 
the fragmentary Egyptian text edited by 
Krall (Vom Konig Bokhoris, Innsbriick, 
1898) and the reference to Suidas (cited 
in my Hist. New Testament,? p. 687).. 
βιβλίον, which here (as in i. 11, xxii. 7- 
18) might mean “letter” or ““ epistle”’ 
(cf. Birt’s Ant. Buchwesen, 20, 21), ap- 
parently represents the book of doom or 
destiny as. a papyrus-roll (i.e. an 
ὀπισθόγραφον, cf. Juv. i. 6) which is so 
full of matter that the writing has flowed 
from the inside over to the exterior, as is 
evident when the sheet is rolled up. 
Here as elsewhere the pictorial details. 
are not to be pressed; but we may 
visualise the conception by supposing 
that all the seals along the outer edge 
must be broken before the content of the 
roll can be unfolded, and that each 
heralds some penultimate disaster (so- 
4 Esd. vi. 20). There is no proof that 
each seal meant a progressive disclosure 
of the contents, in which case we should 
have to imagine not a roll but a codex in 
book form, each seal securing one or two 
of the leaves (Spitta). Zahn (followed 
by Nestle, J. Weiss, and Bruston) im- 


I—5. 


σφραγῖσιν ἑπτά. 


αὐτό. 


ΑΠΟΚΛΛΥΨΙΣ ΙΩΏΑΝΝΟΥ 


383 


2. Καὶ εἶδον ἄγγελον “ἰσχυρὸν κηρύσσοντα ἐν ς Defined 


Ἢ - Ἐ by Φ. μ., 
φωνῇ μεγάλῃ, “Tis ἄξιος ἀνοῖξαι τὸ βιβλίον, καὶ λῦσαι τὰς cj. Ps. 
a ἢ ; ΟΣ a 5 clii. 20. 
σφραγῖδας αὐτοῦ ;᾿ 3. καὶ οὐδεὶς ἐδύνατο ἐν TH οὐρανῷ οὐδὲ ἐπὶ 
τῆς γῆς οὐδὲ ὑποκάτω τῆς γῆς ἀνοῖξαι τὸ βιβλίον οὔτε βλέπειν 
4. Καὶ ἐγὼ ἔκλαιον πολὺ ὅτι οὐδεὶς ἄξιος εὑρέθη ἀνοῖξαι 
MS 8.2 a d = Genit. 
5. kat “ets “ἐκ τῶν πρεσβυτέρων partic. 


τὸ βιβλίον οὔτε βλέπειν αὐτό. 


proves upon this theory by taking ὄπ. 
with κατεσφρ. and thus eliminating any 
idea of the βιβλίον being ὀπισθόγραφον : 
it simply rests on (ἐπὶ) the right hand, as 
a book does, instead of being held ἐν 
the right hand, as a roll would be. But 


ἐπὶ τ. 8. is a characteristic irregularity of 


grammar ; to describe a sealed book as 
‘* written within ” istautological; ἀνοῖξαι 
could be used of a roll as well as of a 
codex ; and ἔσωθεν would probably have 
preceded yeyp. had it been intended by 
itself to qualify the participle. A Roman 
will, when written, had to be sealed seven 
times in order to anthenticate it, and 
some have argued (e.g. Hicks, Greek 
Philosophy and Roman Law in the N. T. 
157, 158, Zahn, Selwyn, Kohler, J. 
Weiss) that this explains the symbolism 
here: the βιβλίον is the testament as- 
suring the inheritance reserved by God 
for the saints. The coincidence is in- 
teresting. But the sacred number in 
this connexion does not require any 
extra-Semitic explanation and the horrors 
of the seal-visions are more appropriate 
to a book of Doom. Besides, the Apoc. 
offers no support otherwise to this inter- 
pretation, for the sole allusion to 
κληρονομεῖν is quite incidental (cf. on 
xxi. 7). The sealing is really a Danielic 
touch, added to denote the mystery and 
obscurity of the future (not of the past, 
En. lxxxix,-xc.). On the writer’s further 
use of the symbol of the book of Doom, 
cf. below on ch. x., xi. 16-19. The 
silence following the opening of the last 
seal certainly does not represent the 
contents of the book (= the promised 
Sabbath-rest, Zahn). This would be a 
jejune anti-climax. Possibly the cosmic 
tragedies that follow that seal are in- 
tended to be taken as the writing in 
question. The βιβλίον is therefore the 
divine course and counsel of providence 
in the latter days (j πάνσοφος τοῦ θεοῦ 
καὶ ἀνεπίληπτος μνήμη, Areth.). Only, 
while an angel read all the divine policy 
to Daniel (Dan. x. 21), the Christian 
prophet feels that Jesus alone is the true 
interpreter and authority, and that the 
divine purpose can only be revealed or 


realised through his perfect spiritual 
equipment (iii. 1, v. 6, cf. 1. 5, ii, 27, iii. 
21, xvii, 14, etc.) 

Ver. 2. The καὶ after ἀνοῖξαι is either 
epexegetic or the mark of a hysteron 
proteron (cf. the awkward οὔτε βλέπειν 
of 3-4, unless Jook here means to look 
into the contents). The cry is a chal- 
lenge rather than an appeal. 

Ver. 3. ὑποκάτω, the under-world of 
departed spirits or of daemons. Not even 
angels ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ (cf. Mark xiii. 32) 
can discharge this function; their réle 
in the Apocalypse is prominent but 
limited. Gunkel prefers to think of a 
magical background to the whole sym- 
bolism ; the book defies the necromancy 
of the universe, but yields to the superior 
power of ‘‘the new god, the lord of the 
book”. For the mythological basis of 
the idea of an opened heavenly book cf. 
Winckler (Alt-ovient. Forsch. ii. 386) and 
Brandis (Hermes, 1867, 283). The triple 
division of the universe was originally 
Babylonian but it had long ago become 
a popular religious idea, (cf. Phil. 11, το). 

Ver. 4. A naive expression of disap- 
pointment, the expectation of iv. 1 being 
apparently thwarted. The sense of con- 
solation and triumph is so strong in this 
book that no tears are shed in self-pity. 
The prophet only weeps at the apparent 
check to revelation. 

Ver. 5. dvoitar... σφραγῖδας, cf. 
Dittenberger’s Sylloge Inscr. Graec. 
790" (first century) τὰς σφ. ἀνοιξάτω. 
Christ’s success is due to his legitimate 
messianic authority as a Davidic scion 
(ῥίζα = shoot or sprout on main stem, ¢f. 
Sibyll. iii. 396); the Davidic descent of 
Jesus was a tenet of certain circles in 
primitive Christianity (Dalman i. ὃ 12). 
Possibly there is an allusion to the origi- 
nal bearing of the O.T. passage :—Jesus 
irresistible and courageous, yet in origin 
humble. In 4 Esdr. xii. 31, 32 the 
messiah's rebuke to the Roman empire is 
thus described: leonem quem uidisti de 
silva euigilantem mugientem et loquentem 
ad aquilam et arguentem eam iniquitatis 
... hic est unctus, quem reseruauit 
altissimus in finem [dierum, qui dicitur 


334 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ TQANNOY 


V. 


Constr. λέγει μοι, “Μὴ κλαῖε" ἰδοὺ “ ἐνίκησεν ὁ *héwy ὃ ἐκ τῆς φυλῆς 


Xv. 9 (iii. 
21, Ps. a 
Sol. iv. 1 
ἐνίκησε 
σκορπ- 
ίσαι), 
infin. of 
remote 
purpose (Blass, § 69, 3). 
x Chron. xxviii. 4. 

56, Apoc. xiv. I. 


3 = 
das αὐτοῦ. 


f Gen. xlix. 9, Heb. vii. 14. 
h Diminut. preferred in Apoc. to ἀμνός of 4th gospel, etc. 


Ιούδα, 5 pila Δαυείδ, " ἀνοῖξαι τὸ βιβλίον καὶ τὰς ἑπτὰ σφραγῖ- 
6. Καὶ εἶδον ἐν μέσῳ τοῦ θρόνου καὶ τῶν τεσσάρων 


’ As a ’ h 5 , i= mw A ike 3 mY 
ζῴων καὶ ἐν μέσῳ τῶν πρεσβυτέρων “ ἀρνίον *éaTHKOs* ὡς ἐσφαγ 


g xxii. 16, Isa. xi. 1-- Rom. Xv. 12, 
i Acts vii. 


1For ἐστηκος (APQ, min., Orig., Hipp., Lach., Al., WH, Bj., Sw., Ws.) Ti., 
Tr., Bs. read [Win. § 14, 5] eotykos (NI, 7, 28, 32, 87), which probably arose from 
dittography. Except for xviii. το, this is the only use of the longer participial form 
(cf. Helbing, 103) in the Apocalypse (even xiv. 1—s.v.l.—reproducing the shorter 


form). 


ex semine David]. ῥάβδος, in sense of 
‘‘shoot” occurs with ῥίζα in Isa. xi. 1 
(cf. το ; Ezek. xix. 11, 12, 14) ; hence the 
combination with the idea of “sceptre” 
(ἐνίκησεν, cf. ii. 27) in a messianic con- 
notation (cf. on xxii. 16). The enigma 
of the world’s history lies with Christ, 
to be solved and to be controlled. Jewish 
eschatology (En. xlvi. 3, xlix. 1) had al- 
ready proclaimed the revealing power of 
messiah, who is “ mighty in all the 
secrets of righteousness... and who 
reveals all the treasures of that which is 
hidden”. John claims that Jesus is the 
legitimate messiah, whose power to un- 
fold God’s redeeming purpose rests upon 
his victorious inauguration of that pur- 
pose. The victory of Christ in v. 5 f. 
follows dramatically upon the allusion in 
ili, 21, but it is to press the sequence too 
far when this scene is taken to represent 
his arrival in heaven “ just after the ac- 
complishment of his victory” (Briggs). 


Ver. 6. Christ, crucified and risen, is 
in the centre. To him all things bow 
and sing. It is prosaic to attempt any 
local definition, as though the author had 
some architectural plan in his mind (ἐν p. 
= “half-way up the throne,” or by repe- 
tition = “ between,” cf. Gen. i. 7), or to 
wonder how so prominent a figure had 
hitherto escaped his notice. Plainly the 
apviov did not originally belong to the 
mise-en-scéne of iv., though the symbol 
may have none the less had an astral 
origin (= Ram, in Persian zodiac). The 
prophet brilliantly suggests, what was a 
commonplace of early Christianity, that 
the royal authority of Jesus was due to 
his suficring for men, but the framework 
of the sketch is drawn from messianic 
dogmas which tended to make Christ 
here a figure rather than a personality.— 
ἀρνίον (like θηρίον, diminutive only in 
form) is not taken from Jer. xi. 19 f. 
(LXX) by a writer who placed it in iuxta- 


position with “lion” owing to the re 


semblance of sound between ΓΤΎ ΣΝ and 
aries (so variously Havet and Selwyn, 
204-208), nor substituted (Vischer, Rauch) 
for the “lion” of the original Jewish 
source, but probably applied (cf. Hort on 
1 Peter i. 19) to Jesus from the messianic 
interpretation of Isa. xvi. 1 or liii. 7, 
though the allusions elsewhere to the 
Exodus (xv. 2 f.) and the Johannine pre- 
dilection for the paschal Lamb suggest 
that the latter was also in the prophet’s 
mind. The collocation of lion and lamb 
is not harder than that of lion and root 
(ver. 5), and such an editor as Vischer 
and others postulate would not have left 
‘‘lion” in ver. 5 unchanged, Christ is 
erect and living (cf. xiv. 1 and Abbott’s 
Foh. Vocabulary, 1725), as ἐσφαγμένον 
(as could be seen from the wound on 
the throat), yet endowed with complete 
power (κέρατα, Oriental symbol of force, 
cf. reff. and the rams’ horns of the 
Egyptian sun-god) and knowledge. For 
ἀρνίον and apvds, cf. Abbott, 210 f. In 
Enoch Ixxxix. 44 f. (Gk.) David is ἄρνα 
prior to his coronation and Solomon ‘a 
little sheep” (i.e., a lamb).—dp8adpots 
x.T.\., the function ascribed by Plutarch 
(de defectu ovac. 13) to daemons as the 
spies and scouts of God on earth. The 
naive symbolism is borrowed from the 
organisation of an ancient realm, whose 
ruler had to secure constant and accurate 
information regarding the various pro- 
vinces under his control. News (as the 
Tel-el-Amarna correspondence vividly 
shows) was essential to an Oriental 
monarch. The representation of Osiris 
in Egyptian mythology consisted of an 
eye and a sceptre (cf. Apoc. ii. 27), denot- 
ing foresight and force (Plut. de Iside, 
51), while the ‘‘eyes” and “ears” of a 
Parthian monarch were officials or officers 
who kept him informed of all that trans- 
pired throughout the country. Else- 


6—8. 


AIIOKAAYYVIZ IQANNOY 


4Qre 
395 


μένον, ἔχων " κέρατα ἑπτὰ καὶ | ὀφθαλμοὺς | ἑπτά, οἵ εἰσι τὰ ™ ἑπτὰ k After 


πνεύματα τοῦ Θεοῦ ἀπεσταλμένοι εἰς πᾶσαν τὴν γῆν. 
καὶ " εἴληφεν ἐκ τῆς δεξιᾶς τοῦ καθημένου ἐπὶ τοῦ θρόνου. 
ὅτε ἔλαβε τὸ βιβλίον, τὰ τέσσερα Loa καὶ οἱ εἴκοσι τέσσαρες πρεσ- 
βύτεροι ἔπεσαν ἐνώπιον τοῦ ἀρνίου, “ ἔχοντες ἕκαστος ἢ κιθάραν καὶ 


(Apyos πανόπτης = starry heaven), 8.0. 125, 2908 ἔ. 
aoristic (Blass, ὃ 59, 4). 


where the seven spirits are identified with 
seven torches, but John is more con- 
cerned to express from time to time his 
religious ideas than to preserve any homo- 
geneity of symbolism (seven eyes simi- 
larly varied in Zech. cf. reff.). The in- 
consistency cannot, in a writing of this 
nature, be taken as evidence of interpola- 
tion or of divergent sources, though it 
may be an editorial gloss. An analogous 
idea underlies Plutarch’s explanation of 
the ‘ travelling ” power of Isis (Iside, 60), 
for which he adduces the old Greek ety- 
mology (= knowledge and movement, 
θεὸς from θέειν “to run”); and this 
etymology in turn (cf. Otto on Theoph. 
ad Autolyc. i. 4) reaches back to a star 
cultus.—N.B. In the Αρος. ἀρνίον, which 
is opposed to θηρίον and is always (ex- 
cept xiii. 11 f.) used of Jesus, denotes not 
only the atoning sacrificial aspect of 
Christ (v. 6, 9 f., 12, xii. 12) but his 
triumphant power (horned) over outsiders 
(xvii. 14) and his own people (vii. 16 f.). 
Neither the diminutive (cf. below, on xii. 
17) nor the associations of innocence and 
gentleness are to be pressed (cf. Spitta, 
Streitfragen der Gesch. $Fesu, 1907, 
173 f.). The term becomes almost semi- 
technical in the Apocalypse. Asa pre- 
Christian symbol, it is quite obscure. 
The text and origin of the striking pas- 
sage in Test. Ios. xix. do not permit 
much more than the inference that the 
leader there (a μόσχος) becomes an 
ap.vés, who, supported by Judah the lion, 
ἐνίκησεν πάντα τὰ θηρία. The virgin- 
birth is probably a Christian interpola- 
tion. No sure root for the symbolism 
has yet been found in astro-theology 
(Jeremias 15 ἢ). For attempts to trace 
back the idea to Babylonian soil, cf. 
Hommel in Exp. Times, xiv. 106 f., 
Havet, 324 f., and Zimmern in Schrader,® 
597f. One Babylonian text does mention 
the blood of the lamb as a sacrificia! 
substitute for man, which is all the more 
significant as the texts of the cultus are 
almost wholly destitute of any allusion 
to the significance of the blood in sacri- 
fice. But no influence of this on pre- 


0 1.€. οἱ πρεσβ. (loose syntax) ὃ 


Dan. vii. 
20 f., viii. 
3, En. Xc. 
371., etc. 
11. 4, iv. 6, 
from 
Zech. iv, 
10 (111. 9): 
eyes= 
stars 
N Viii. 5, Cf. iii. 3, Vii. 14, Xix. 3, 
Pp Xiv. 2, xv. 2. 


7. Kat ἦλθεν 
8. καὶ 


m iv. 5, 


Christian messianism, or of contemporary 
cults on this element of Christian sym- 
bolism, can be made out from the extant 
evidence. In any case, it would merely 
supply the form for expressing a reality 
of the Christian experience. 

Ver. 7. A realistic symbol of the idea 
conveyed in John iii. 35, xii. 49, etc. 

Ver. 8. A thrill of satisfaction over 
Christ’s ability. ‘‘It is the manner of 
God thus to endear mercies to us, as he 
endeared a wife to Adam. He first 
brought all creatures to him, that he 
might first see that there was not a help- 
meet for him among them” (Goodwin). 
John lays dramatic emphasis on ¥esus 
only. ἐνωπ. τ. ἀ. (as before God him. 
self, xix. 4).—y. 9., cf. Soph. Oed. Tyr. 4, 
πόλις δ᾽ ὁμοῦ μὲν θυμιαμάτων γέμει. 
An essential feature in the rites of Roman 
sacrifice was music played on fébicines ; 
the pateva, a shallow saucer or ladle with 
a long handle attached, was also em- 
ployed to pour wine on the altar. Harps 
held by living creatures who had no 
hands but only wings, and the colloca- 
tion of a harp played by a person who is 
at the same time holding a bowl, are 
traits which warn us against prosaically 
visualising such visions. Hirscht com- 
pares the adoration of Rameses II. be- 
fore the sun-god, the monarch’s left hand 
holding his offering, his right grasping 
a sceptre and scourge. The fragrant 
smoke of incense rising from the hand 
of a worshipper or from an altar in the 
primitive cultus (cf. Ezek. viii. 2) to 
lose itself in upper air, became a natural 
symbol for prayer breathed from earth to 
heaven ; see Philo’s τὸ καθαρώτατον τοῦ 
θύοντος, πνεῦμα AoyiKdv.—ai... ἁγίων, 
probably an editorial gloss like xix. 8 ὁ, 
suggested by the verbal parallel in viii. 3 
(so, e.g., Spitta, Volter, Briggs, Julicher, 
J. Weiss, Wellhausen, etc.). Contrast 
with this verse (and ver. 4) the descrip- 
tion of the enthusiastic seamen and pas- 
sengers who ‘‘candidati, coronatique, 
et tura libantes,” praised and blessed 
Augustus in the bay of Puteoli as ‘‘ He 
by whom we live, and sail secure, and 





386 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΎΨΙΣ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 


V. 


q Ps. cxli.2. φιάλας χρυσᾶς γεμούσας “ θυμιαμάτων [" αἵ εἰσιν at προσευχαὶ τῶν 


r =a, by 
false at- 
traction. 

8 Isa. xlii. 
10, Ps. 
XXxXiii. 3, 
cxliv. 9, 
etc. 

t So xiv. 3, 
cf. Judith 
XVi. I (A), 
13 (15), 
Ps, Sol. 
lil. 2, etc., 
and Eus. 


αὐτοῦ" 


II. Καὶ εἶδον, καὶ ἤκουσα 2 φωνὴν ἀγγέλων 


ἁγίων] " 9. καὶ *adoucw ὡδὴν ὅ καινὴν λέγοντες, 
“ἴλξιος εἶ λαβεῖν τὸ βιβλίον καὶ ἀνοῖξαι τὰς σφραγῖδας 


ὅτι " ἐσφάγης καὶ “ἠγόρασας τῷ Θεῷ “ἥ ἐν τῷ ” αἵματί σου, 
lol Ν A 
2x πάσης φυλῆς καὶ γλώσσης καὶ λαοῦ καὶ ἔθνους, 
ἈΝ ug > ὺ - A) Tet Peal y 4 ν γε a 
10. καὶ ἐποίησας αὐτοὺς τῷ Θεῷ ἡμῶν ἢ βασιλείαν καὶ ἢ ἱερεῖς - 
‘ ‘ 
Vz , 1. πον ας ea 
καὶ *Baotkedoouow | ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς. 


πολλῶν κύκλῳ τοῦ 


28. ἐπι A a 
uCf.Isa. θρόνου καὶ τῶν Lwwv καὶ τῶν πρεσβυτέρων, καὶ ἣν ὁ ἀριθμὸς αὐτῶν 


lili. 7. 

v See on ἢ 
1 Cor. vi. 20, and below xiv. 3-4. 
cf. 4 Esd. iii. 7. i 
1 Kings xxii. 19, cf. τ Pet. iii. 22. 


wi. 5, of. τ Pet. i. 18-19. 
y i. 6, Briggs here also would omit the καί. 


x vii. 9, fr. Dan. iii. 2, 4, 7, 
Z XXii. 5. a vii. 11, 


1 For βασιλευσομεν (Pr., vg.), βασιλευσουσιν (“Ὁ , τ, min., S., etc., Bg., Ti., Ws., 
Holtzm., Bs., Bj., Briggs, etc.) is preferable to βασιλευουσιν (AQ, min., Syr., Anda. 
Lach., Al. Tr., WH, Sw., Jacoby 448-449) in sense of Matt. v. 5. 


2 After ἡκουσα Ti., Tr. (WH marg.), Bj., Sw. add ws (ΝΟΥ, min., Syr., Areth., 


etc.). 


enjoy our freedom and fortunes”’ (Suet. 
Vit. Aug. 98.) 

The scene or stage of the apocalyptical 
drama 1s occupied by an angelic and 
heavenly chorus, who upon this solemn 
and glad occasion give their plaudite 
or acclamation ,of glory to the Lord. 
The future which God rules is revealed 
by him through Christ; and this moves 
enthusiastic gratitude, till the universe 
tings from side to side with praise. 

Ver. 9. φδὴν x. followed (14) by ἀμήν, 
as in the worship of the church on earth 
(Col. iii. 16, 1 Cor. xiv. 15, 16). ἅδουσιν 
(historic present) no longer to God as 
creator (iv. 11) but to the Lamb as re- 
deemer, for the cost and scope and issue 
of his redemption. This unique and 
remarkable passage in early Christian 
literature marks the growing sense and 
value attaching to Jesus as being far 
more than a mere national messiah, in 
fact as the one assurance of God 
possessed by men, as their pledge of 
bliss and privilege and pardon. And 
this is due to his redeeming function, 
upon which the relationship of men 
to God depends. It is a further stage 
of the Christian development when, as 
in Asc. Isa. ix. 27-32, the vision and 
praise of Jesus is followed by that of 
the Holy Spirit (35, 36) and of God 
himself (37-42). The prophet John’s 
“theology’’ is less advanced. Uni- 
versal allegiance and homage paid not, 
as in the contemporary sense of the 
οἰκουμένη, to a Czsar’s proud preten- 


sions, but to the sacrifice of a Christ (see 
G. A. Smith, Hist. Geogr. 478, 479) isa 
new thing in the world. An undivided 
church, gathered from the divisions of 
humanity, is also a new and unexpected 
development, to which a foil is presented 
by the exclusiveness voiced at the annual 
Jewish paschal rite, and in the daily 
Shema-prayer (‘‘ For Thou hast chosen 
us from amongst all nations and tongues. 
. . - Blessed be the Lord that chose in 
love his people Israel”’). For ἀγοράζειν 
(cf. note on i. 5)=the buying of slaves, 
cf. Dittenberger’s Orientis Gr. Inscript. 
Selectae, 338*. 

Ver. to. An allusion not so much to 
the idea of xx. 4, where the literal sway 
of the saints (=life eternal, in substance) 
is confined to a certain section of them, 
or to xxii. 5 (on the new earth, cf. xxi. 
1), as to ii. 26. Compare the primitive 
patristic notion, reflected, ¢.g., by Vict. 
oni. 15: adorabimus in loco ubi steterunt 
pedes eius, quoniam ubi illi primum stete- 
runt et ecclesiam confirmauerunt, i.e., in 
Judza, ibi omnes sancti conuenturi sunt 
et dominum suum adoraturi. The whole 
verse sets aside implicitly such a Jewish 
pretension as of Philo, who (de Abrah. 
19) hails Israel as the people 6 pot δοκεῖ 
τὴν ὑπὲρ παντὸς ἀνθρώπων γένους ἱερω- 
σύνην καὶ προφητείαν λαχεῖν. 

Ver. 11. This outer circle of myriads 
(the following χιλιάδες is an anti-climax) 
of angelic retainers—a favourite trait in 
the later Jewish pageants of heaven—does 
not address praise directly to the Lamb. 


g—13. ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ITQANNOY 


387 


μυριάδες μυριάδων καὶ "χιλιάδες χιλιάδων, 12. “ λέγοντες φωνῇ b From 


an. vii. 


μεγάλῃ, IO, cf. En. 
3, = \ Xlv. 22, 
““Aguds | ἐστιν τὸ ἀρνίον τὸ ἐσφαγμένον λαβεῖν τὴν δύναμιν καὶ xi. 1, Ixxi 

8, etc. 

d λ - Xe , ἄν, ὁ δ ‘ ‘ ‘ \ , x 2 TN 

πλοῦτον Kat “σοφίαν καὶ ἰσχὺν καὶ τιμὴν καὶ δόξαν καὶ ᾿ εὐλο- ς Constr. 
, » ad sens. = 
“yiav. λέγοντες. 

ἃ Rom. x. 


I Kat A , a 2 A > n Lg Jae, a a ‘ge Ρ . 
3. ι Wav κτισμα οεν τῳ ουρανῷ και ἐπὶ THS ys και “ὑπο 12, ΧΙ. 33. 


, a a ἀνὰ Ν A , ‘ ὙΎΜΕ Ὶ > a , ” Phil. iv. 
κάτω τῆς γῆς καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς θαλάσσης Kal τὰ ἐν αὐτοῖς πάντα, ἤκουσα 10, Eph. 


oe 
® \éyovtas, ay 


e Cf. onvii. 
«{ ~ jae. an , ‘ nm , ic 2 , Ry 6 I2. 
Τῷ καθημένῳ ἐπὶ τῷ θρόνῳ 2 καὶ τῷ dpviw ‘i εὐλογία καὶ Tiwi τ, 
A A r. i. 20. 
τιμὴ καὶ ἡ δόξα Kal τὸ κράτος εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων. " Phil. i 
10, Eph. i. 
ὃ he Aba x : 21, cf. ver. 
3 and Ps. cxlv. 4, Ign. Trall. ix. 1. h Irreg. apposition like xvii. 10, xix. 14, etc, iOn 


art. cf, Win. § 18, 42. 


tagios A (Bg., Ti., WH marg., Ws.), constr. ad sensum [αξιος et, S.], is prefer- 
able to the easier agvov of 30), min., Syr. 


2 τω Opovw AQ, min., Ande (edd.) is preferable to του @povov of WYP, 1, etc., S., 


Areth. (WH text, Bj.). 


Ver. 12. For similar arrangements in 
Jewish doxologies, see Gfrérer, ii. 146-8 ; 
and, for iox. Tu. δόξ. see Dan. ii. 37 
(LXX). τήν groups together the seven 
words of the panegyric; honour and 
glory and praise are due to one whose 
victorious death has won him the power 
of bestowing incalculable riches on his 
people and of unriddling the future, 
against all opposition (Weiss). The 
refrain of δύν. is heard in xi. 17, and 
δόξα had been already associated with 
“wealth” and ‘‘power” (Eph. i. 18 f.) or 
““wisdom’”’ (2 Cor. iii. 7 f., iv. 4, etc.) in 
Christ (contrast Isa. lili. 2 LXX). The 
act of taking the book (ver. 7) suggests 
the general authority and prestige of the 
Lamb, which is acknowledged in this 
doxology. The order in 12, 13 is the same 
as in Ps. ciii. 20-22, where the angels 
are followed by creation in the worship. 
When God’s creatures and servants 
magnify, praise, and bless him, yielding 
themselves to his dominion, and ac- 
knowledging that to him all the strength 
and wealth and wisdom of life rightly 
belong, God is honoured. Christ was 
glorified by God (cf. Acts iii. 13, Rom. 
vi. 4, John xvii. 1) at the resurrection, 
when God’s power raised him to eternal 
life; he is glorified by men in their hom- 
age and submission to him as the sole 
medium of redemption and revelation. 

Ver. 13. From the whole creation a 
third doxology rises, catching up the last 
word (εὐλογίᾳ) of the preceding, and ad- 
dressed—as in the primitive and distinc- 
tive confessions of early Christianity 


(e.g., John xvii. 3, 1 Tim. ii. 5) to God 
and Jesus alike (vii. 10). In this chorus 
of praise (i. 6), by a sweep of the poet’s 
imagination, even departed spirits and 
sea-monsters (ἐπὶ τ. θαλ., rather than 
seafaring men) join—‘‘even all that is 
in” earth and sea and heaven (cf. the 
title of the sun in the Rosetta inscription 
of 196 B.Cc., μέγας βασιλεὺς τῶν τε ἄνω 
K. τ. κάτω χωρῶν). Sacrifice is on the 
throne of the universe; by dying for 
men, Jesus has won the heart and confi- 
dence of the world. Thus the praise of 
God the creator (ch. iv.) and the praise 
of Jesus the redeemer (ch. v.) blend in 
one final song, whose closing words indi- 
cate that the latter’s prestige was not 
confined to a passing phase of history. 
The crime for which the messiah de- 
thrones the rulers (in Enoch xlvi.) is just 
‘*because they do not praise and extol 
him, nor thankfully acknowledge whence 
the kingdom was bestowed upon them, 
. . . because they do not extol the name 
of the Lord of Spirits”. In the papyrus 
of Ani (Z. B. D. 3) Ra is worshipped by 
the gods ‘‘who dwell in the heights and 
who dwell in the depths ”; whilst Isis and 
Osiris, as possessing supreme power, 
received honour ‘‘in the regions under 
the earth and in those above ground” 
(Plut. de Iside, 27). Compare the fine 
rabbinic saying of Rabbi Pinchas and R. 
Jochanan on Ps. c. 2: ‘ though all 
offerings cease in the future, the offering 
of praise alone shall not cease; though 
all prayers cease, thanksgiving alone 
shall not cease’”’. 


338 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


I. KAI εἶδον ὅτε ἤνοιξεν τὸ ἀρνίον * μίαν 


V. 14—VI. 
ἔλεγον, *“*Aunv’’* ‘Kat ot πρεσβύ- 


ἃ ἐκ τῶν ἑπτὰ σφρα- 


Ν 3 ΄- ~ ε x 
Ῥἤκουσα ἑνὸς ἐκ τῶν τεσσάρων ζῷων λέγοντος ὡς φωνὴ ἢ 


b See v. 11. 


ἘΝ το, χῖχ. 14. Καὶ τὰ τέσσερα {oa 
1 Detached z ὶ σεκύνησαν. 
Neen gaa επεσαν και προ € n 
(so often 
in O.T.), 
cf. τ mid γίδων, kat 
Xiv. 16. 
Just. 
A pol. i. 65, 67. a See v. 5, etc. 


1For φωνῆς (P, 1) read φωνη [harsh ex. 
Bg., Lach., Ti., Tr., Bs., Diist., Bj. [φωνῇ 


Ver. 14. The prologue is brought to 
a splendid close by ‘‘amen” from the 
four ζῷα, who have the last as they had 
the first word (iv. 8), followed by silent 
adoration from the πρεσβύτεροι. As in 
the liturgical practice of early Christian 
assemblies, so in the celestial court, the 
solemn chant of praise to God is suc- 
ceeded by the “amen” (“ δᾶ similitu- 
dinem tonitrui... amen reboat,” Jerome) ; 
Q, Areth., etc. Alf., bring this out by 
reading here τὸ ᾿Αμήν. By prefacing the 
struggle on earth (vi. f.) with a vision of 
the brilliant authority and awe of heaven 
(iv., v.), the prophet suggests that all the 
movements of men on earth, as well as 
the physical catastrophes which overtake 
them, are first fore-shadowed in heaven 
(the underlying principle of astrology, cf. 
Jeremias, 84 f.) and consequently have 
a providential meaning. In iv., v. the 
writer takes his readers behind the scenes ; 
the whole succeeding tide of events is 
shown to flow from the will of God as 
creator of the universe, whose executive 
authority is delegated to Jesus the re- 
deemer of his people. This tide breaks 
in two cycles of seven waves, the seventh 
(viii. 1) of the first series (vi. I-vii. 17) 
issuing in a fresh cycle (viii. 2-xi. 19) in- 
stead of forming itself (as we should ex- 
pect) the climax of these preliminary 
catastrophes in nature and humanity, 
disasters which were interpreted (R. F. 
237-239) as the premonitory outbursts of 
an angry deity ready to visit the earth 
with final punishment. Observe that 
throughout the Apocalypse wind and fire 
are among God’s scourges handled by 
angels in order to punish the earth and 
the waters, according to the conception 
preserved in Apol. Arist. 2: ‘‘ Moreover, 
the wind is obedient to God, and fire 
to the angels; the waters also to the 
daemons, and earth to the sons of men” 
(Ante-Nicene Library, ix. 257 f.). The 
visitation is divinely complete, sevenfold 
like Ezekiel’s oracles against the nations 
(xxv.-xxxii.), Apoc. vi.-ix. has, for its 
staple, little more than a poetic ela- 
boration of Mark xiii. 8 (cf. 24, 25), 


of nom. indep.] ACQ., etc. » And., Areth. 
7, 87, 93, WH, Sw., Ws.}. 


international complications due to the 
scuffing and strife of peoples, and 
physical disasters as a fit setting for 
them. 

The vision of the seven seals opened 
(vi. I-vili. 2): vi. I, 2, a Parthian inva- 
sion. 

CHAPTER VI.—Ver. 1. The command 
or invitation ἔρχου is not addressed to 
Christ (as xxii. 17. 20). If addressed to 
the seer, it is abbreviated from the 
ordinary rabbinic phrase (ueni et uide) 
used to excite attention and introduce 
the explanation of any mystery. The 
immediate sequel (omitted only in 
ver. 4), καὶ εἶδον, does not, however, 
forbid the reference of ἔρχου to the 
mounted figures ; hearing the summons, 
John looked to see its meaning and result. 
The panorama of these four dragoons. 
(“ad significandum iter properum cum 
potentia”’) is partly sketched from Semi- 
tic folk-lore, where apparitions of horse- 
men (cf. 2 Macc. ii. 25; ᾿ξ: ; “ithe 
Beduins always granted me that none 
living had seen the angel visions... 
the meleika are seen in the air like horse- 
men, tilting to and fro,” Doughty, Arad. 
Deserta, i. 449) have been a frequent 
omen of the end (cf. ¥os. Bell. vi. 5. 
Sih. Or. iii. 796), partly reproduced from 
(Persian elements in) Zech. i. 7 fi, vi. 
i-8, in order to bring out the disasters (cf. 
Jer. xiv. 12, xxi. 7) prior to the last day. 
The direct sources of vi. and ix. lie in 
Lev. xxvi. 19-26; Ezek. xxxiii. 27, xxxiv.. 
28 f., and Sir. xxxix. 29, 30 (“fire and 
hail and famine and θάνατος, all these 
are created for vengeance; teeth of wild 
beasts and scorpions and serpents and a 
sword taking vengeance on the impious 
to destroy them”). An astral background, 
in connection with the seven tables of 
destiny in Babylonian mythology, each 
of which was dedicated to a planet of a 
special colour, has been conjectured by 
Renan (472); cf. Chwolson’s Die Ssabier, 
lii. 658, 671, 676 f. For other efforts to: 
associate these horsemen with the winds 
or the planets, see Jeremias (pp. 24 ἢ} 
and Μ. W. Miiller in Zeitr. f. d. neutest. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


389 


5. 

Bpovtijs, °“"Epxou’’. 2. Kat εἶδον, καὶ ἰδοὺ ἵππος “λευκός, καὶ λύε 

ὃ καθήμενος ἐπ᾽ αὐτὸν ἔχων “ τόξον " καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῷ στέφανος, καὶ πα εν 
ἐξῆλθε νικῶν καὶ ἵνα νικήση. 4. Καὶ ὅτε ἤνοιξε τὴν σφραγ- ἃ oe 
ia τὴν ϑευτέραν, ἤκουσα τοῦ δευτέρου ζῴου λέγοντος, “«ὄξρχου ἢ. ΜΕΥ 
4. Καὶ ἐξῆλθεν ἄλλος ἵππος ‘ πυρρός “ καὶ τῷ καθημένῳ ἐπ᾽ αὐτὸν 5a aa, 


ἐδόθη αὐτῷ λαβεῖν τὴν εἰρήνην ἐκ τῆς γῆς Kal “ἵνα ἢ" ἀλλήλους ε 
ἐ σφάξουσιν ᾿ καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῷ μάχαιρα μεγάλη. 


g Cf. on iii. 9. 


Wiss. (1907), 290-316. But the proofs 
are fanciful and vague, though they 
converge upon the view that the colours 
of the steeds at least had originally 
some planetary significance. ‘The series, 
as usual, is divided into the first four 
and the second three members. The 
general contents of vi. 1-8 denote various 
but not successive phases of woe (only 
too familiar to inhabitants of the Eastern 
provinces) which were to befall the em- 
pire and the East during the military 
convulsions of the final strife between 
Rome and Parthia. The ‘‘ primum omen,” 
for John as for Vergil, is a white horse, 
ridden by an archer. 

Ver. 2. White = royal and victorious 
colour, cf. the white horse of the Persian 
kings (Philostr. Vit. Ap. i.). The tri- 
umphant figure of the mounted bowman 
is by no means to be identified with that 
of the Christian messiah or of the gospel. 
It would be extremely harsh and con- 
fusing to represent the messiah as at once 
the Lamb opening the seal and a figure 
independently at work. The initial period 
of the gospel was not one of irresistible 
triumph, and matters have become too 
acute for John to share the belief voiced 
in Mark xiii. 10. Besides, the messiah 
could hardly be described as preceding 
the signs of his own advent, nor would 
he be on the same plane as the following 
figures. The vision is a tacit antithesis, 
not an anticipation, of xix. 11 f.; the 
triumph of the world which opens the 
drama is rounded off by an infinitely 
grander triumph won by Christ.—vikav 
kK. κιτιλ. John was too open-eyed to 
ignore the fact that other forces, besides 
the Christian gospel, had a success of 
their own on earth. What is this force ὃ 
Not the Roman Empire, as if the four 
steeds represented the first four emperors 
(so, variously, Renan, Spitta, Weiz- 
sicker), but a raid of the Parthians (so 
most edd. from Vitringa to Erbes, Vélter, 
Holtzm., Bousset, Bruston, Ramsay, 
Scott), which represented war in its 


VOL, Vv. 


am. λεγ- 


‘ τ ὍΝ 4 “ 
5. Kat ὅτε ¢ xii. 3, ἅπ. 
rey. N.T. 


h Mk, xiii. 8, etc., Ap. Bar. Ixx. 3, 4 Esd. vi. 24, xiii. 31, Sib. Or. ii. 156. 


most dreaded form for inhabitants of the 
Eastern provinces. There is no need to 
find any definite reference to the raid of 
Vonones (Wetstein) or of Vologesus who 
invaded Syria in 61-63 A.D. The simple 
point of the vision is that the Parthians 
would be commissioned to make a suc- 
cessful foray, carrying all before them. 
The bow was the famous and dreaded 
weapon of these oriental cavalry ; 
Νικήτωρ was a title of Seleucus, and 
γικητής of the Persian satrap. One 
plausible hypothesis (developed by Erbes)}: 
refers the basis of the seal-visions to (a) 
the triumphs of Augustus and Tiberius, 
(Ὁ) the bloody feuds in Palestine under 
Caligula, (c) the famine in Syria under 
Claudius (Ac. xi.), (d) the subsequent 
pestilence, (¢) the Neronic martyrs, and 
(7) the agitations of the empire under 
Galba, etc. (for portents cf. Plin. Ep. vi. 
16, 20; Tacit. Hist. i. 4). Buta similar 
collocation of portents is found in the 
reign of Titus; and apart from the mis- 
interpretation of the first seal, it is arbi- 
trary and jejune to suppose that this 
prophet’s splendid, free reading of provi- 
dence was laboriously spelt out from 
details of more or less recent history. 

Vv. 3, 4. The second seal opened : 
A swordsman representing (red = martial 
colour) war and bloodshed, “is permitted 
to make men slay one another”. The 
allusion to the merciless weapon (Plut. 
de Iside, 11) of the sword as Rome’s 
national arm thus places the Parthian 
and Roman empires side by side (τῆς 
γῆς generally, not Judaea in particular), 
but the vision of war is also connected 
directly with the two following visions 
of famine (5, 6) and mortality (from pesti- 
lence, 7, 8). The seven punishments 
drawn up by rabbinic theology (Pirke 
Aboth, v. 11 f.) were: three kinds of 
famine, pestilence, noisome beasts, and 
captivity or exile. 

Vv. 5, 6, The third seal opened = 
famine. 

Ver. 5. The spectral figure of Hunger 


25 


390 


i Cf. Lam. 
iv. 8-9 
(blood- 
lessness) : 


‘"Epxou”’. 


fthe αὐτὸν ἔχων "ζυγὸν ἐν τῇ χειρὶ αὐτοῦ. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ ITQANNOY 


Vi. 


” Η͂ τὰ Η͂ ΄ ” a ΄ , ré 
ἤνοιξε τὴν σφραγῖδα τὴν τρίτην, ἤκουσα τοῦ τρίτου ζῴου λέγοντος, 
Καὶ εἶδον, καὶ ἰδοὺ ἵππος μέλας, καὶ ὁ καθήμενος ἐπ’ 


6. καὶ ἤκουσα ὡς φωνὴν 


ἡ. Καὶ ὅτε ἤνοιξε τὴν σφραγῖδα τὴν τετάρτην, ἤκουσα φωνὴν τοῦ 


8. καὶ εἶδον, καὶ ἰδοὺ ἵππος 


m” ~ 
1 ὄνομα αὐτῷ ὁ Θάνατος. 


Greek A Ἢ 4 = A Σ 
terms ἐν μέσῳ τῶν τεσσάρων ζῴων λέγουσαν, 
αἰανής Ι ἐς : A , m 4 , ‘ a , - Lg 
and aléow Χοῖνιξ σίτου ™ δηναρίου, καὶ τρεῖς χοίνικες κριθῶν » δηναρίου * 
ior λιμὸς. ἤι ς OF Ns > Nou! a5 , ” 
k Prov. xvi. καὶ τὸ ἔλαιον καὶ τὸν οἶνον μὴ " ἀδικήσης. 
x1, Ezek. 
Iv. 16, v. 
I, xlv. το. ” ” 
1 -᾿ἡμερή. τετάρτου {wou λέγοντος, ““ Ἔρχου ᾿᾿. 
σιος ο , Nive , Peers 2A 
τροφῇ χλωρός, καὶ ὃ καθήμενος ἐπάνω αὐτοῦ, 
(Diog. 
Laert. 8, 


18, cf. Herod. vii. 251). 


aor. of prohibition. o Hom. 1]. viii. 479. 


m Gen. price (sc. πωλεῖται): cf. Matt. xx. 2. 


n Thuc. ii. 71, iv. 98, 


τ Read avtw (NQQ, 5, And., Areth., Tr. marg.: cf. xiv. 4, 9, xix. 14) for per avrov 
(edd.), and, after εδοθη, avtw (Q, min., vss., Bg., Bs.) for the correction avrots 


(SACP, edd.). 
second, third, and fourth riders (Wellh.)]. 


‘holds a balance or pair of scales (ζ. liter- 
ally = the beam, see reff.) for measuring 
‘bread by weight, to personify (ver. 6) 
bad times, when provisions became 
cruelly expensive. One χοῖνιξ of wheat, 
the usual rations of a working man 
for a day, is to cost twelve times its 
normal price, while the labourer’s daily 
pay will not command more than an 
eighth of the ordinary twenty-four mea- 
sures of the coarser barley. Grain is 
not to disappear entirely from the earth, 
otherwise there would be no famine. 
But food-stuffs are to be extremely scanty 
and therefore dear (cf. Lev. xxvi. 26; Ezek. 
iv.16). These hard times are aggravated 
{καὶ adversative) by the immunity of 
oil and wine, which are, comparatively 
speaking, luxuries. One exasperating 
feature of the age would be the sight of 
wine and oil flowing, while grain trickled 
slowly into the grasp of the famishing. 
The best explanation of this realistic 
exception is to regard it as a water-mark 
of the Domitianic date (for details see 
the present writer’s study in Expos. Oct. 
1908, 359-369). In 92 A.D. Domitian had 
made a futile attempt to injure the cultiva- 
tion of the vine in the provinces, which 
led to widespread agitation throughout 
Ionia. His edict had soon to be with- 
drawn, but not till it had roused fear and 
anger. Hence the words hurt not the 
wine have the force of a local allusion to 
what was fresh in his readers’ minds. 
The point of the saying lies in the recent 
events which had stirred Smyrna and the 
surrounding townships, and which pro- 
vided the seer with a bit of colour for his 
palette as he painted the final terrors. 


[In any case, the avtots refers to Death and Hades, not to the 


It is as if he grimly said: ‘* Have no 
fears for your vines! There will be no 
Domitian to hurt them. Comfort your- 
selves with that. Only, it will be small 
comfort to have your liquid luxuries 
spared and your grain reduced almost to 
Starvation point.” Or, the prophet’s 
meaning might be that the exemption 
of the vine would only pander to drunken- 
ness and its attendant ills. The addition 
of τὸ ἔλαιον is probably an artistic em- 
bodiment, introduced in order to fill out 
the sketch. The cultivation of the olive 
accompanied that of the vine, and the 
olive meant smooth times. It is no era 
of peace; far from that, the prophet im- 
plies. But the olive, ‘the darling of 
Peace”’ (as Vergil calls it), flourishes un- 
checked, so mocking and awry are the 
latter days. For ἀδικεῖν = “injure” (a 
country), see reff., vii. 2, and Dittenber- 
ger’s Sylloge Inscr. Graec. 557. This 
Domitianic reference of vi. 6 was first 
worked out by S. Reinach (Revue Arch- 
éolog. 1901, 350 f.) and has been accepted 
by Harnack, Heinrici, Bousset, J. Weiss, 
Abbott, Holtzmann, Baljon, and others. 
There is no allusion to Jos. Bell. v. 13, 6, 
or to the sparing of gardens during the 
siege of Jerusalem (S. Krauss, in 
Preuschen’s Zeitschrift, 1909, 81-89). 

Vv. 7, 8. The fourth seal opened. 
pestilence and mortality. 

Ver. 8. χλωρός, pale or livid as a 
corpse.—éravw αὐτοῦ, for the ordinary 
ἐπ᾽ αὐτόν, a grammatical variation which 
has no special significance. In this 
Dureresque vignette the spectre of Hades, 
bracketed here as elsewhere with Death, 
accompanies the latter to secure his booty 


6—10. 


κι 
και ὁ 


, ~ a > = r> ε , ‘ 2 x - \ > 

τέταρτον τῆς γῆς ἀποκτεῖναι "ἐν ῥομφαίᾳ καὶ ἐν λιμῷ καὶ ἐν 
- ’ fol “ 

"θανάτῳ καὶ ὑπὸ τῶν θηρίων τῆς γῆς. 


Ξ τὰ q 
τὴν πέμπτην σφραγῖδα, εἶδον ὑποκάτω τοῦ θυσιαστηρίου τὰς “ ψυχὰς 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ΙΩΏΩΑΝΝΟΥ 


391 


P°ASys “ ἠκολούθει “ αὐτῷ Kal ἐδόθη αὐτῷ ἐξουσία ἐπὶ τὸ i. 18, xx. 


13-14, 
Hos. xiii. 
14, Isa. 
XViil. 5. 
xiv. 13, cf. 
Luke ix. 


9. Kat ὅτε ἤνοιξε 


a A a , 49. 
τῶν ἐσφαγμένων “Ὑ διὰ τὸν λόγον τοῦ Θεοῦ καὶ διὰ τὴν “ μαρτυρίαν τ Instrum. 


ἣν εἶχον, 10. καὶ ἔκραξαν φωνῇ μεγάλῃ, λέγοντες, ““ “Ἕως πότε, ὃ 


pestilence (LXX). 


of victims. So Nergal, the Babylonian 
Pluto, is not content with ruling the 
regions of the dead but appears as an 
active personification of violent destruc- 
tion, especially pestilence and war, in- 
flicting his wounds on large masses rather 
than on individuals (Jastrow, 66,67). A 
similar duality of conception, local and 
personal, obtained in Semitic and Hel- 
lenic mythology (cf. é.g., ix. 11); only, 
Death is not here personified as an angel 
(with Jewish theology, cf. Eisenmenger’s 
Eindecktes $ud. i. 854 f., 862 f.). As the 
chief partner in this grim league, he is 
given destructive power over a certain 
quarter of the earth (τὸ τέτ. colloquially) ; 
his agents are the usual apocalyptic 
scourges (cf. Ezek. xiv. 21, Ps. Sol. xiii. 
2f., with Plut. Istde, 47 for the Iranian 
expectation of λοιμὸς καὶ λιμός as inflic- 
tions of Ahriman) against which the Jew- 
ish evening prayer was directed (“keep 
far from us the enemy, the pestilence, the 
sword, famine and affliction”). War, 
followed by famine which bred pestilence, 
was familiar in Palestine (Jos. Antiq. xv. 
9) during the first century a.p. Indeed 
throughout the ancient world war and 
pestilence were closely associated, while 
wild beasts multiplied and preyed on 
human life, as the land was left untilled. 
In Test. Naphth. 8, etc., Beliar is the 
captain of wild beasts. Note that the 
prophet sees only the commissions, not 
the actual deeds, of these four dragoons: 
not until vi. 12 f. does anything happen. 
The first four seals are simply arranged 
on the rabbinic principle (Sohar Gen. fol. 
91), “ quodcunque in terra est, id etiam in 
coelo est, et nulla res tam exigua est in 
mundo quae non ab alia simili quae in 
coelo est dependeat”. The four plagues 
(a Babylonian idea) are adapted from 
Ezek. xiv. 12 f. Contemporary disasters 
which may have lent vividness to the 
sketch are collected by Renan (pp. 323 f.). 

Vv. g-11. The fifth seal opened. 

Ver. 9. The scene changes from earth 
to heaven, which appears as a replica of 
the earthly temple with its altar of burnt 
offering. As the blood of sacrifices flowed 


t Rare with act. verb. 


« Abbott, 
Diat. 
2332a. 

8 xviii. 8;= 

u xx. 4 (cf. Heb. xii. 23). V i. 0, Xii. 17 

at the base of the altar (xvi. 7), the blood 

representing the life, the symbolism is 
obvious. It was mediated by rabbinic 
ideas of the souls of the just (e.g., of 

Moses) resting under the divine throne 

of glory; cf. R. Akiba’s saying, ‘“ qui- 

cumque sepelitur in terra Israel, perinde 
est ac si sepeliretur sub altari: quicumque 
autem sepelitur sub altari, perinde est 
ac si sepeliretur sub throno gloriae” 

(Pirke Aboth, 26). The omission of 

Ἰησοῦ after μ. may suggest that the 

phrase is intended to include not so 

much the heroic Jews who fell in the 
defence of their temple against Rome 

(Weyland) as pre-Christian Jewish mar- 

tyrs (cf. Heb. xi. 39, 40) who are raised 

to the level of the Christian church, and 
also those Jews who had been martyred 
for refusing to worship the emperor (cf. 

vii. 9, xvii. 6, and Jos. B. $. vii. 10, 1). 

But the primary thought of the Christian 

prophet is for Rome’s latest victims in 

the Neronic persecution and the recent 
enforcement of the cultus under Domi- 
tian. The general idea is derived from 

Zech. i. 12, Ps. Ixxix. 10, and En. xxii. 5 

(‘and I saw the spirits of the children 

of men who were dead, and their voice 

penetrated to the heaven and com- 
plained,” from the first division of Sheol). 

Ver. το. Like Clem. Rom., John is 
fond of δεσπότης as implying the divine 

might and majesty (3 Macc. iil. 29, v. 28). 

This severe and awe-inspiring concep- 

tion (cf. Philo, quis rer. div. haer. 6) means 

that God will vindicate his holiness, which 
had been outraged by the murder of the 
δοῦλοι for whom he is responsible. In 
contemporary pagan religions through- 
out Asia Minor, the punishment of 
wrong-doing is often conceived in the 
same way, viz., as the answer to the 
sufferer’s appeal (cf. Introd. 8 2), not 
simply as a spontaneous act of divine 
retribution. ‘ How long wilt thou refrain 
from charging and avenging our blood 

upon (ἐκ as in r Sam. xxiv. 13, Ps. xlii. 1) 

those who dwell on the earth” (i.e., 

pagans)? The bleeding heart of primitive 

Christendom stands up and cries, “1 


392 


w =oBepios ” δεσπότης ὃ 
κύριος 
(Philo), 
Plato, 
Euthyd. 
302: cf. 
on Luke 


ἑκάστῳ “στολὴ “ λευκή, καὶ 


il. 29, Acts iv. 24, Did. x. 3, Dan. iii. 37, ix. 8, εἴς... 
Ziii. 4, 5, 18. 


2, Deut. xxxii. 43, etc. y John xvi. 2. 


have suffered”. For ἐκδικεῖν αἷμα cf. 
Dittenberger’s Sylloge Inscript. Graec. 
8162 (1 cent. A.D.) ἵνα ἐγδικήσῃς τὸ 
αἷμα τὸ ἀναίτιον, etc.; for ἐκδ. ἐκ. (= 


%)) of vengeance, cf. Luke xviii. 3-8 


(ἀπὸ), a close parallel in thought, though 
this pathetic, impatient thirst for blood- 
revenge, which has ‘the full drift of 
Ps. xciv. below it” (Selwyn) is inferior 
not only to τ Peter ii. 23 but to the 
synoptic wail. The Jewish atmosphere 
is unmistakable (cf. 2 Macc. vii. 36; also 
Deissmann’s Licht vom Osten, 312 f.), but 
this does not mean that the passage was 
necessarily written by a Jew. In that 
case we should have expected some allu- 
sion to the vicarious, atoning power of 
the martyrs’ death (R. ¥. 181). The 
prophet evidently anticipated further 
persecution, since he wrote on the 
verge of the end precipitated by the 
Domitianic policy (cf. on ii. 13). Such 
persecution follows natural disturbances, 
as in the synoptic apocalypse (Matt. 
(xxiv. 6-7, 21 f.), but the outline of the 
fifth seal is taken from Enoch, where 
(xlvii.) the prayer and blood of the mar- 
tyred saints ‘‘rise from the earth before 
the Lord of Spirits,” while the angels 
rejoice that such blood has not been shed 
in vain. In En. xevii. 3-5 the prayer of 
the righteous for vengeance overtakes 
their persecutors on the day of judgment 
with woeful issues (xcix. 3, 16). ‘* Per- 
sist in your cry for judgment, and it shall 
appear unto you; for all your tribula- 
tion will be visited on the rulers, and on 
all their helpers, and on those who 
plundered you” (civ. 3, cf. xxii. 6, 7, 
where Abel’s spirit complains of Cain).— 
κατ. κιτιλ. always in Apocalypse op- 
posed to the saints, almost as ‘‘the 
world’’ to ‘‘the pious”’ in modern phrase- 
ology. This usage is largely paralleled 
by that of the Noachic interpolations in 
Enoch (see Charles on xxxvii. 5), where 
the phrase has either unfavourable or 
neutral associations. ἅγιος here (as 
John xvii. 11= Did. x. 3, πανάγιος Clem. 
Rom. xxxv. 3, lvili. 1) applied by a com- 
paratively rare usage (1 Peter i. 15 and 
Apoc. iv. 8 being dependent on O.T.) to 
Sod, whose intense holiness must be 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


eee , > 
6 ἅγιος καὶ ἀληθινός, οὐ 
“ “ 37 

ἡμῶν ἐκ τῶν κατοικούντων ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς; 


Vi. 


*kplvets καὶ "ἐκδικεῖς τὸ 7 αἷμα. 


11. καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτοῖς 


8... ’ > - - > , 3, 
ἐρρέθη αὐτοῖς ἵνα ἀναπαύσωνται ἔτι 


x 2 Kings ix. 7, 2 Chron. xxiv. 22, cf. Hab. i. 
a As ix. 4 for ἐρρήθη Attic. 


in antagonism to the evil and contradic 
tions of the world (Titius, 9-11). 

Ver. 11. The white robe assigned each 
(Blass, § 32, 4) of these martyr-spirits as. 
a pledge of future and final glory (vii. 9) 
and a consoling proof that no judgment 
awaited them (xx. 4-6), is a favourite gift 
in the Jewish heaven (cf. Enoch Ikxii. 
15 f., and Asc. Isa. ix. 24 f.). The inter- 
mediate state was a much debated ques- 
tion in apocalyptic literature, and early 
Christian thought fluctuates between the 
idea of a provisional degree of bliss (as. 
here and, e.g., Clem. Rom. i. 3, ‘‘ those 
who by God's grace have been perfected 
in love possess the place of the pious,. 
and they shall be manifested at the visit- 
ation of God’s kingdom”) and a direct, 
full entrance into heavenly privileges— 
especially, though neither uniformly nor 
exclusively, reserved for martyrs (Clem. 
Rom. v., Polyk. ad Phil. ix. 2, Heb. xii. 
23, etc.); cf. Titius, 44-46. A cognate 
idea is reproduced in Asc. Isa. ix. 6 f., 
where in the seventh heaven Abel, Enoch 
and the Jewish saints appear all clothed 
‘in the garments of the upper world” 
(i.e., in their resurrection-bodies) but not. 
yet in full possession of their privileges, 
not yet seated on their thrones or wear- 
ing their crowns of glory. These are not. 
theirs, till Christ descends to earth and 
ascends to heaven again.—“tAnd they 
were told to rest (or wait quietly) for ἃ. 
little while yet,’’ as they had been doing 
till the successive shocks of providence 
stirred them to an outburst of eager and 
reproachful anticipation. To rest implies. 
to cease crying for vengeance (cf. iv. 8). 
Gfr6rer (ii. 50) cites a rabbinic tradition 
that the messiah would not come until 


all souls in ap (an intermediate resting- - 


place of the departed?) were clothed’ 
with bodies. ἕως «.7.A., this is closely 
and curiously reproduced, not so much 
from ideas preserved in the contemporary 
Apoc. Bar. xxiii. 4, 5 (where the end of” 
the world comes when the predestined 
number of human beings is completed) as. 
from the religious tradition also used in 
Clem. Rom. ii., lix., Justin (Afo/. i. 45), 
and the contemporary 4th Esdras (iv. 
36 ἢ, quoniam in statera ponderauit» 


11--14. 


χρόνον μικρόν, ἕως πληρωθῶσιν 1 καὶ οἱ σύνδουλοι " αὐτῶν καὶ οἷν 
© ἀδελφοὶ ἢ αὐτῶν οἱ μέλλοντες ὅ“ ἀποκτέννεσθαι ὡς καὶ αὐτοί. 
Καὶ εἶδον ὅτε ἤνοιξε τὴν σφραγῖδα τὴν ἕκτην ᾿ καὶ “σεισμὸς μέγας ς For 
ἐγένετο, καὶ ὁ ἥλιος ἐγένετο ᾿ μέλας ὡς σάκκος ἐ τρίχινος, καὶ ἡ 
σελήνη ὅλη ἐγένετο ὡς αἷμα, 13. καὶ οἱ "ἢ ἀστέρες τοῦ οὐρανοῦ 
ἔπεσαν εἰς τὴν γῆν, ὡς συκῆ βάλλει τοὺς “ὀλύνθους αὐτῆς ὑπὸ 


ἀνέμου μεγάλου σειομένη * 


form, cf. Helbing, 73-74. 
Dio Cass. Ixvi. 23, etc. 
g am. Acy. N.T. 


14. Kal 6 οὐρανὸς ἀπεχωρίσθη ὡς 


ATIOKAAY¥IS, IQANNOY 393 


Note 
repet. of 
poss. gen. 
1Χ. 21. 


12. 


ethnic 
use (= 
fellows of 
same 
religious 
commun- 
ity) cf. 
(OFS) 3 as 
96 f. 

ἃ On Aeolic 


δ viii. 5, xi. 13, xvi. 18, Matt. xxiv. 7, 4 Esd. vi. 14, Ap. Bar. Ixx. 8, 
f Isa. xiii. 10, 1. 3, Joel ii. 3, 10, 30-31. Matt. xxiv. 29, Ass. Mos. x. 4 f. 
h Isa. xxxiv. 4, Ezek. xxxil. 7-8, cf. Sib. Or. iii. 82, viii. 238, 413 (190). 


1 For πληρωσονται (Areth.) read πληρωθωσιν (AC, 20, vg., S., Cypr., Bg., Diist.. 
Lach., WH, Ws., Bj., Sw., Bs.) [πληρωσωσιν SPQ, etc., And. Ti., Al. Tr., 


Holtzm.). 


saecula et mensura mensurauit tempora 
et non commouit nec excitauit, usquedum 
impleatur praedicta mensura... quando 
impletus fuerit numerus similium uobis) 
which thinks not of mankind but of the 
righteous (cf. Apoc. Bar. xxx. 2, and 
Heb. xi. 40). The atmosphere of this 
belief goes back to the first century B.c., 
as in Enoch (xlvii., cf. ix. xxii.) ‘and the 
hearts of the holy were filled with joy 
that the number of righteousness had 
drawn nigh, and the prayer of the right- 
eous was heard, and the blood of the 
tighteous required, before the Lord of 
Spirits” (cf. below, ch. xi. 15 f.). The 
thought is repeated in Ep. Lugd. from 
this passage (‘‘day by day those who 
were worthy were seized, filling up their 
number, so that all the zealous people 
and those through whom our affairs here 
had been especially established, were 
collected out of both churches’’). It 
had been already developed otherwise 
in 4th Esdras ‘iv. 35 f., where the seer’s 
impatience for the end is rebuked and 
God’s greater eagerness asserted. ‘‘ Did 
not the souls of the righteous question 
thus in their chambers, saying, ‘How 
long are we still to stay here ? et quando 
ueniet fructus 'areae mercedis nostrae? ’ 
And the archangel Jeremiel answered 
them and said, ‘When the number of 
your fellows is complete’.” Substituting 
martyrs for the righteous, the author of 
our Apocalypse has exploited the idea 
thus familiar to him as a devout Jew; 
his first four visions come mainly through 
Zechariah ; for the next he adapts this 
later post-exilic notion. The Neronic 
victims and their fellows occupied in his 
mind the place filled by the early Jewish 
saints in the reverent regard of contem- 
porary Jews. As Renan notices (317 f.), 


this thirst for vengeance was in the 
air after Nero’s death, shared even by 
Romans; one legend (Suet. Nero, xlviii., 
Dio, Cass. xiii. 28) told how, as Nero 
fled to his last retreat, during a thunder- 
peal the souls of his victims burst from 
the earth and flung themselves upon 
him.—As the safety of the physical uni- 
verse rested on the safety of the right- 
eous, according to the Jewish notion, so 
any massacres of the latter at once affected 
the stability of the world. Hence the 
sequence of vv. 1r and 12 f. There is no 
hint that these physical aberrations were 
temporary. Yet the following catastro- 
phes (vii. f.) plainly presuppose a universe 
in its original and normal condition. It 
depends upon the theory adopted of the 
book whether this points merely to such 
discrepancies as are not unfamiliar in 
literature (especially imaginative litera- 
ture), or to recapitulation, or to the pre- 
sence of different sources. 

Vv. 12-17. The sixth seal opened (cf. 
Crashaw’s To the Name of Fesus, 220- 
234). 

ἘΠ 12-14. The earthquake (reff.), dar- 
kening of sun by atmospheric disturb- 
ances, (Verg. Georg. i. 463 f., Lucan i. 
75 f., 522 f. Compare Ass. Mos. x. 4 f.: 
et tremebit terra. Usque ad fines suas 
concutietur . . . sol non dabit lumen et 
in tenebras conuertet se, etc.; for Baby- 
lonian background cf. Schrader,*® 392 
f.), reddening of the full moon as in a 
total eclipse (cf. reff.), the dropping of 
stars, the removal of the sky, and the 
displacement of mountain and island 
(En. i. 6, see below on xiv. 20) are all 
more or less stereotyped features of the 
physical situation in apocalyptic eschat- 
ology, where naturally (cf. Jos. Bell. iv. 
4, 5) agonies and distortions of the uni- 


994 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


Wie 


. ~ Ν A “ , 
i Jer. iv. 24, βιβλίον ἑλισσόμενον, ‘kal πᾶν ὄρος καὶ νῆσος ἐκ τῶν τόπων 
Ezek. 


nw a ‘ ε - “ “ ‘ erie 
xxxviii. αὐτῶν ἐκινήθησαν ᾿ 15. kat ot βασιλεῖς τῆς γῆς καὶ ol “μεγισ- 


20, Nah. 
16 Ὁ ΟΣ 
Sen. Nat... 2 
Quaes. iv. δοῦλος καὶ ἐλεύθερος 


Ἀ ‘ -“ 
τᾶνες καὶ οἱ ᾿ χιλίαρχοι καὶ οἱ "᾿ πλούσιοι καὶ οἱ ἰσχυροὶ καὶ πᾶς 


ἣ 3 Ἂν 
Ὁ ἔκρυψαν ἑαυτοὺς εἰς τὰ σπήλαια καὶ εἰς τὰς 


26. = a a , 
k xviii. 23 πέτρας τῶν “ ὀρέων, 16. 5" καὶ λέγουσι τοῖς ὄρεσι καὶ ταῖς πέτραις, 


= the 
Parthian 


chiefs (Macedonian term)? cf. Dan. v. 23, LXX, Ps. Sol. ii. 36. C 8 
From Hos. x. 8, Isa. ii. ro f., vi. 16, Ezek. xxxix. 17-20, Luke xxiii. 30; 


m Jas. v. 1. n 


a characteristic of the wicked in En. xcvii. 3, c. 4, Cil. I. 


cf. Helbing, 41. 


1 On form see Win. § 8, 9. 


o For uncontracted form, 


1 The πασα prefixed to νησος by S. smoothes out the constr. of παν. 


verse precede some divine punishment of 
men (Verg. Georg. i. 365 f.). 

Vv. 15-17. Note the sevenfold descrip- 
tion of the effect produced on humanity 
(xix. 18, cf. xiii. 16), the Roman χιλίαρχοι 
(=tribuni), the riches and rank of men 
(tox. a dramatic touch = defiant authority, 
like Mrs. Browning’s Lucifer: ‘ strength 
to behold him and not worship him, 
Strength to be in the universe and yet 
Neither God nor God’s servant’’; see 
especially Ps. Sol. xv. 3, 4), the dis- 
tinction of slaves and free as a pagan, 
never as an internal Christian, division; 
also the painting of the panic from O.T. 
models (reff.). Those who are now the 
objects of dread, cower and fly to the crags 
and caves—a common sanctuary in Syria 
(cf. Introd. § 8). Mr. Doughty describes 
a meteoric shock in Arabia thus: 
“ἐᾷ thunder-din resounded marvellously 
through the waste mountain above us; 
it seemed as if this world went to wrack. 
. .. The most in the mejlis were of 
opinion that a ‘star’ had fallen” (Ar. 
Des. i. 462, 463). The Hosean citation 
(cf. Jer. viii. 3) here, as in Luke, gives 
powerful expression to the dread felt by 
an evil conscience; even the swift agony 
of being crushed to death is preferable to 
being left face to face with the indigna- 
tion of an outraged God. To stand (cf. 
Luke xxi. 36) is to face quietly the 
judgment of God (1 John ii. 28), which 
is impossible except after a life which 
has resolutely stood its ground (Eph. vi. 
13) amid reaction and served God (Apoc. 
vi. 10, 11). The panic of kings, etc., is 
taken from the description of the judg- 
ment in Enoch Ikxii.-lxiii., where before 
the throne of messiah “the mighty and 
the kings” in despairing terror seek 
repentance in vain; ‘‘and one portion of 
them will look on the other, and they 
will be terrified, and their countenance 
will fall, and pain will seize them,” at 
the sight of messiah. In Apoc. Bar. xxv. 


also the approach of the end is heralded 
by stupor of heart and despair among 
the inhabitants of the earth, while a 
similar stress falls (in Sap. vi. I-9) on 
kings, εἴς, and (in En. xxxvii.-Ixxi. 
generally) on the earth’s rulers. There 
is no need to suspect kal... ἀρνίον 
(16) as an editorial gloss (Vischer, Spitta, 
Weyland, de Faye, Volter, Pfleiderer, von 
Soden, Rauch, J. Weiss, Briggs) ; it may 
be a characteristic touch designed to 
point the O.T. citation (for αὐτοῦ in 17 
or in xxii. 3 cf. r Thess. iii. rz, 2 Thess. 
ii. 16, 17), rather than a scribal or editorial 
insertion in what was originally a Jewish 
source. 

The great day of God’s wrath has 
come, but the action is interrupted by an 
entre-acte in vii., where as in x. I-xi. 13, 
the author introduces an intermezzo be- 
tween the sixth and the seventh members 
of the series. A change comes over the 
spirit of his dream. But although this 
oracle is isolated by form and content 
from its context, it is a consoling rhap- 
sody or rapture designed to relieve the 
tensicn by lifting the eyes of the faithful 
over the foam and rocks of the rapids on 
which they were tossing to the calm, 
sunlit pool of bliss which awaited them 
beyond. They get this glimpse before 
the seventh seal is opened with its fresh 
cycle of horrors. The parenthesis con- 
sists of two heterogeneous visions, one 
(x-8) on earth and one (9-17) in heaven. 
The former (and indeed the whole see 
tion, cf. the ἑστῶτες of 9) is an implicit 
answer to the query of vi. 17, τίς δύναται 
σταθῆναι; it is an enigmatic fragment of 
apocalyptic tradition, which originally 
predicted (cf. Ezek. ix. 1 f.) God's safe- 
guarding of a certain number of Jews, 
prior to some catastrophe of judgment 
(‘Cry havoc, and let slip the winds of 
war!’’) upon the wicked. The chapter 
is nota literary unit with editorial touches 
(Weyland, Erbes, Bruston, Rauch), nor is 


15—17. 


“ Πέσετε ἐφ᾽ ἡμᾶς καὶ κρύψατε ἡμᾶς 
ἀπὸ προσώπου τοῦ καθημένου ἐπὶ τοῦ θρόνου, 
καὶ ἀπὸ τῆς ὀργῆς τοῦ ἀρνίου, 
17. P ὅτι ἦλθεν ἡ ἡμέρα ἡ μεγάλη τῆς ὀργῆς αὐτοῦ,] 


‘ , , a ᾽ 
καὶ τίς δύναται 4 σταθῆναι ; 


ATIOKAAY¥IS IQANNOY 


Mal. iii. 2, 
Zeph. i. 
14, 18, etc, 

q Win. § 14, 
4. 


αντων (SC, 38, vg., Syr., 3., Haym., etc., Ti., Tr., WH, Sw., Bj.) is an emen- 
dation of the original and difficult avrov (APQ, min., Me., Arm., Aeth., And., 


Areth., Pr., Lach., Al., Ws., Bs.). 


9-17 acontinuation of vi. (Spitta). Vv. 
1-8 are a Jewish fragment incorporated 
by the author? who writes g-17 himself 
(so, e.g., Vischer, Pfleiderer, Schmidt, 
Porter, Bousset, von Soden, Scott, Well- 
hausen). The fact that a selection, and 
not the whole, of the Jews are preserved, 
does not (in view of 4 Esdras) prove 
that a Jewish Christian (Volter, J. Weiss) 
must have written it. The scenery is 
not organic to John’s proper outlook. 
After ver. 8 he shows no further interest 
in it. The winds are never loosed. 
The sealing itself is not described. The 
sealed are not seen. An apparent allu- 
sion to this remnant does occur (xiv. 1), 
but it is remote; John makes nothing 
of it; and the detached, special character 
of vii. 1-8 becomes plainer the further 
we go into the other visions. The sealed 
are exempted merely from the plague of 
the winds, not from martyrdom or perse- 
cution (of which there is no word here); 
one plague indeed has power to wound, 
though not to kill, them (ix. 4,5). The 
collocation of the fragment with what 
precedes is probably due in part to cer- 
tain similarities like the allusions to the 
wind (vi. 13), numbering (vi. 11), and 
the seals (vi. 1 f.). The real problem is, 
how far did John take this passage liter- 
ally? This raises the question of the 
relationship between 1-8 and 9-17; either 
(a) both are different forms of the same 
belief, or (Ὁ) two different classes of 
people are meant. In the former event 
(a) John applies the Jewish oracle of 1-8 
to the real Jews, t.e., the Christians, who 
as a pious remnant are to be kept secure 
amid the cosmic whirl and crash of the 
latter days (vi. 12-17, cf. iii. το and the 
connexion of Nahum i. 5, 6, and 7). The 
terror passes and lo! the saints are seen 
safe on the other side (9-17). This in- 
terpretation of Christians as the real 
Israel or twelve tribes is favoured not 
only by early Christian thovght (cf. 1 
Peter i. 1, Jas. i. 1, Herm. Sim. ix. 17), 
but by the practice of John himself (e.g., 
xviii. 4). Here as elsewhere he takes 


the particularist language of his source 
in a free symbolic fashion; only, while 
the archaic scenery of 1-8 suffices for a 
description of the safeguarded on earth, 
he depicts their beatified state (g-17) in 
ampler terms. The deeper Christian con- 
tent of his vision implies not deliverance 
from death but deliverance through death. 
His saints are not survivors but martyrs. 
Hence the contrast between 1-8 and 9-17 
is one of language rather than of temper, 
and the innumerable multitude of the 
latter, instead of being a supplement to 
the 144,000, are the latter viewed after 
their martyr-death under a definitely 
Christian light. The O.T. imagery of 
1-8 mainly brings out the fact that the 
true Israel (Gal. vi. 16) is known and 
numbered by God; not one is lost. 
The alternative theory (6) holds that in 
taking over this fragment and adding 
another vision John meant Jewish Chris- 
tians by the 144,000. The latter identi- 
fication (so, ¢.g., Prim., Vict., Hausrath, 
Vischer, Spitta, Hirscht, Forbes, Bousset) 


is less probable, however, in view of the 


general tenor of the Apocalypse (cf. 
Introd. § 6), for the usual passages cited 
as proof (cf. notes on xiv. 1 f., xxi. 12 
and 24) are irrelevant, and while John 
prized the martyrs it is incredible that 
9-17 was meant to prove that martyrdom 
was required to admit Gentile Christians 
even to a second grade among the elect 
(Weizsacker, Pfleiderer), A Jewish 
Christian prophet might indeed, out of 
patriotic pride, regard the nucleus of 
God’s kingdom as composed of faithful 
Jews, without being particularist in his 
sympathies. Paul himself once held this 
nationalist view (Rom. ix.-xi.), but it 
is doubtful if it represented his final 
position, and in any case the general 
conception of the Apocalypse (where 
Christians are the true Jews, and where 
particularist language is used metaphori- 
cally, just because literally it was obso- 
lete) tells on the whole in favour of the 
view that 9-17 represents 1-8 read in the 
light of v. 9 (so, e.g., de Wette, Bruston. 


6 AIIOKAAYVIS IQANNOY vh. 
39 
ae anet? VII. 1. Μετὰ τοῦτο εἶδον τέσσαρας ἀγγέλους ἑστῶτας ἐπὶ τὰς 
1κ6 
Tiamat, τέσσαρας γωνίας τῆς γῆς, "κρατοῦντας " τοὺς τέσσαρας » ἀνέμους 
Nn. Xvill. κα ~ a a , ΕΙΣ ats ~ - 2 rome a 
ΕΝ τῆς γῆς, va μὴ πνέῃ ἄνεμος ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, μήτε ἐπὶ τῆς θαλάσσης, 
er. ΧΙΣ. 
36, Ezek. 


XXXvii. 9, Dan. vii. 2. 


Porter, Wellhausen, and Hoennicke: das 
Fudenchristentum, 194 f.). Only, the 
general description of redeemed Chris- 
tians in v. g is specifically applied in vii. 
14 to the candidatus martyrum exercitus. 
Here as elsewhere John apparently con- 
ceives the final trial to be so searching 
and extensive that Christians will all be 
martyrs or confessors. The wonderful 
beauty of 9-17, whose truth rises above 
its original setting, requires no comment. 
It moved Renan (479, 480), after criticis- 
ing “16 contour mesquin” of the Apoca- 
lypse in general, to rejoice in the book’s 
‘*symbolical expression of the cardinal 
principle that God is, but above all that 
He shall be. No doubt Paul put it better 
when he summed up the final goal of the 
universe in these words, that God may be 
all in all, But for a long while yet men 
will require a God who dwells with them, 
sympathises with their trials, is mindful 
of their struggles, and wifes away every 
tear from their eyes.” 

CuaPTER VIi.—Ver. 1. As on the 
synoptic scheme (Matt. xxiv. 31), physical 
convulsions and human terrors are fol- 
lowed by a pause during which the 
saints are secured. It is impossible and 
irrelevant to determine whether the winds’ 
blast and the sealing were already con- 
joined in the fragment or oral traditions 
which lay before this editor, or whether 
their combination is due to himself. 
They reflect the tradition underlying the 
synoptic apocalypse (Mark xiii. 24-27, 
εἴς.» cf. Apoc. vi. 12-vii. 3), but here the 
safeguarding of the elect comes before, 
instead of after, the advent, and the four 
winds are agents of destruction instead 
of mere geographical points; besides, the 
role of messiah is omitted altogether. 
It is assumed not merely that these 
angels are the spirits of the four winds 
(Zech. vi. 5, and repeatedly in Enoch, e.g., 
Ixix. 22, “the spirits of the waters and 
of the winds and of all zephyrs”), but 
that some onset of the winds is imminent 
(ver. 2, cf. En. xviii. 22), as part of the 
horrors of the last catastrophe (for puni- 
tive winds, see Sir. xxxix. 28). Stray 
hints proving the existence of such a 
tradition (cf. Dan. vii. 2) have been col- 
lected (cf. S.C. 323 ἢ: A.C. 246, 247) 
¢.¢., from Sibyll. viii. 203 f., etc., where a 


hurricane is to sweep the earth previous 
to the resurrection of the dead (trees 
being here singled out as most exposed 
to a storm’s ravages). If such allusions 
are not mere echoes of the present pas- 
sage, they would appear to indicate a 
runlet of eschatological tradition flowing 
behind more important ideas. Or are 
the saints like trees of God (Ps. Sol. xiv. 
2, 3) never to be uprooted by a wind 
or onset of foes (ibid. viii. 6, xvii. 13) ? 
It is no longer possible to be sure. In 
En. xviii 1 f. by a semi-Babylonian touch, 
the four winds are identified with the 
four pillars of the heaven and the founda- 
tions of the earth ; in Apoc. Bar. vi. 4, 5, 
four angels with lamps are restrained by 
another angel from lighting them (cf. 
also E. Bi. 5303). There seems to be no 
allusion to the notion of a blast (from the 
sea) as a form of mortal fate (e.g., Oed. 
Col. 1659, 1660; Iliad, vi. 345 f.) ; on the 
contrary, the idea goes back to Zech. 
vi. 8 (LXX), whence the prophet had 
already developed vi. 1-8. As xiv. 1 t. 
roughly answers to vii. 9 f., so the ap- 
pearance of wild beasts out of the 
agitated sea of the nations (in Dan. vii. 
1-8) corresponds to the sequence of 
Apoc. vii. 1-4, and xiii. x f. 

The earth is a rectangular plane or 
disc on which John looks down from 
heaven’s dome resting on it, to observe 
(ver. 2) a fifth angel ‘‘ ascending” from 
the sun-rising (the east as the source of 
light, cf. on xvi. 20, the site of paradise, 
the sphere of divine activity ?). ζῶντος, 
here (as in xv. 7; cf. Heb. x. 31) in O.T. 
sense (cf Deut. xxxii. 39 f.; Ezek. xx. 33; 
Jer. x. 10, etc.) of vitality to succour and 
to punish, God’s “life” being manifested 
in his effective preservation of the saints 
and chastisement of their enemies or of 
the world in general. He lives and keeps 
alive. Here, as in the parent passage, 
Ezek. ix. 4-6 (cf. Exod. xii. 13 f. and the 
“Egyptian” character of the plagues in 
chap. viii.), the true δοῦλοι of God are 
distinguished by a mark denoting God’s 
ownership. Before the crisis good and 
evil must be discriminated (Spitta, 80 f). 
Cf. Ps. Sol. xv. 6 f. on the immunity of 
the righteous, ὅτι τὸ σημεῖον τοῦ θεοῦ ἐπὶ 
δικαίους εἰς σωτηρίαν, λιμὸς καὶ poy φαία 
καὶ θάνατος μακρὰν ἀπὸ δικαίων : hkere- 


=—4. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ LQANNOY 397 


pte ἐπὶ wav! δένδρον. 2. Καὶ εἶδον ἄλλον ἄγγελον ἀναβαίνοντα c Cf. Jos. 
eu. 


ἀπὸ “ ἀνατολῆς ἡλίου, ἔχοντα σφραγῖδα Θεοῦ °Lavtos* καὶ ἔκραξε 
'φωνῇ μεγάλῃ τοῖς τέσσαρσιν ἀγγέλοις οἷς ἐδόθη ᾿ αὐτοῖς ἀδικῆσαι 
τὴν γῆν καὶ τὴν θάλασσαν, λέγων, 3. “Μὴ ὅἥ ἀδικήσητε τὴν γῆν 
μήτε τὴν θάλασσαν, μήτε τὰ δένδρα, ἄχρι ᾿ σφραγίσωμεν τοὺς 
"δούλους τοῦ Θεοῦ ᾿ἡμῶν ἐπὶ τῶν " μετώπων αὐτῶν ᾿᾿. 
ἤκουσα τὸν ἀριθμὸν τῶν ἐσφραγισμένων ᾿ ἑκατὸν τεσσεράκοντα τέσ- 


iii. 7, 8 
and below 
χοὰς 

d Cf. xvi. 12 
and on 
ΧΧΙ τ: 
Isa. xli. 2, 
Ezek. 
xliii. 2, 
Bar. iv. 
36, ν. 5. 
En. v. I, 


4. Kat 


capes 'xididdes, ἐσφραγισμένοι ἐκ πάσης "“ φυλῆς υἱῶν "᾿Ισραήλ᾽ ἕξ Jub.xxi.4. 


g Aor. subj. ‘‘action not yet begun,” Burton, 164. 


more common ἄχρις οὗ or av cf. Blass, § 65, 10, 
ΧΕΙ. 16, Xiv. I, 9, Xvii. 5, XX. 4, XXil. 4. 
cf. ix. 11, ii. 18, etc. 


f Cf. on iii. 
8 


ἢ t.e. the angels, as Matt. xxiv. 31. ‘For tha 


i vii. II-12, xix. 5. k Only (in N.T.) in ix. 4, 


1 Irreg. indep. nom. after accus., as often in Apoc., 
m Only here in Apoc., except xxi. 12 (also an interpolated source ?). 


1 For παν (NP, 1, etc., Ti., Bj., Sw., WH) Lach., Tr., Al. Diist., Ws. read τι 


(CQ, min., vg., Pr.) [ἐπὶ δενδρου A, Me., Syr. Arm., Aeth. (Bs = δενδρον ?) : 


conj. 


Naber (deleting also p. τα SevSpa in ver. 3) ἐπι ανυδρου]. 


as these plagues hunt down the wicked, 
"τὸ γὰρ σημεῖον τῆς ἀπωλείας ἐπὶ τοῦ 
μετώπου αὐτῶν. This royal, sacred sign, 
which in Ezekiel is the cross or Tau as 
the symbol of life and is here probably 


sab, authenticates the bearers as 
God’s property (cf. Herod. ii. 113, vii. 
233) and places them beyond risk of loss. 
It identifies them with his worship and 
also (cf. on ii. 17) serves to protect them 
as an amulet against harm (see Deissm. 
351, 352 on φυλακτήρια as protective 
marks and amulets). In Test. Sol. (tr. 
Conybeare, ¥ew. Quart. Rev. 1898, p. 
34) an evil spirit declares he will be 
destroyed by the Saviour ‘‘ whose number 
"(στοιχεῖον), if anyone shall write it on 
his* forehead, he will defeat me”. Mr. 
Doughty also describes (Ar. Des. i. 171) 
a false Christ in Syria who declared he 
‘had God’s name sculptured between his 
eyebrows; i.e. the wrinkles resembled 
the Arabic hieroglyph for Allah. For the 
religious significance of such tattooing as 
a mark of divine ownership see R. S. 316; 
and, for the connection of vi. 12 f. and 
~vii. 1 f., the basal passage in Dan. xi. 40, 
44, xil. τ. The parallel device of Anti- 
christ later on (xiii. 16, etc.) shows that 
this sealing is something special, baptism 
or the possession of the Spirit (asin Paul) 
ws the guarantee of destined bliss. A 
contemporary expression of the idea oc- 
‘curs in Clem. Rom. lix., lx.: ‘We 
will ask that the Creator of all things 
preserve intact to the end the appointed 
number of his elect throughout all the 
world, etc.”. As Apoc. vi. 1-8 and 12 
γῇ, are free reproductions, with a special 
»oplication, of the ideas underlying Mark 


xiii. 7, 8, 24, 25, so Αρος. vii. 1 f. is an 
imaginative sketch on the lines of Mark 
xiii. 27. The Apocalypse, however, has 
no room for the false messiahs of Mark 
xiii. 6, 22, etc. (cf. on Apoc. xiii. 11 f.) as 
a peril. See further 4 Esd. vi. 5, ‘‘ Ere 
they were sealed who laid up the treasure 
of faith,” and Melito (Otto ix. 432, 476) 
the apologist, who preserves a dual tra- 
dition of the end, including wind as 
well as fire = et selecti homines occisi 
sunt aquilone uehementi, et relicti sunt 
iusti ad demonstrationem ueritatis, (whilst 
at the deluge of fire) seruati sunt iusti in 
arca lignea iussu dei. But the Apoc- 
alypse like Philo, stands severely apart 
from the current Stoic notion, adopted 
in Sib. iv. 172 f.; 2 Peter, etc., of a de- 
struction of the world by means of a final 
conflagration. 


Ver. 4. After a pause, in which the 
sealing is supposed to have taken place, 
the writer hears that the number of the 
sealed is the stereotyped 144,000, twelve 
thousand from each of the twelve tribes 
of Israel (a ‘‘ thousand ” being the primi- 
tive subdivision of a clan or tribe, like the 
English shire into ‘‘hundreds”). The 
enumeration of these tribes (5-8) contains 
two peculiarities, (a) the substitution of 
Joseph for Ephraim, a variation to which 
we have no clue, and (δ) the omission of 
Dan. The latter reflects the growing dis. 
repute into which Dan fell; it either 
stands last (e.g. in P.; Josh. xix. 40 ἢ: 
Jud. i. 34) or drops out entirely, while 
it is curiously connected in the Talmud, 
as already in Test. XII. Patr. (Dan. 5); 
with Beliar, and in Irenzus (v. 30, 32) as 
in Hippolytus (de Antichr. 5, 6) with the 


398 


AITIOKAAY¥IZ IQANNOY 


VII. 


5. ἐκ φυλῆς ᾿Ιούδα δώδεκα χιλιάδες ἐσφραγισμένοι ° 
ἐκ φυλῆς Ρουβὴν δώδεκα χιλιάϑες " 
ἐκ φυλῆς Γὰδ δώδεκα χιλιάϑες - 


6. 


ἐκ φυλῆς ᾿Ασὴρ δώδεκα χιλιάδες - 


ἐκ φυλῆς Νεφθαλεὶμ δώδεκα χιλιάδες " 


ἐκ φυλῆς Μανασσῆ δώδεκα χιλιάδες " 


7. ἐκ φυλῆς Συμεὼν δώδεκα χιλιάδες - 


ἐκ φυλῆς Λευεὶ δώδεκα χιλιάδες - 


ἐκ φυλῆς ᾿Ισσαχὰρ δώδεκα χιλιάδες " 


nCf.oniii. 8, 
ὃ 


ο Cf. ν. 9. 

p Irreg. 
appos. to 
piur. 
sense of 9. 
ὄχλος. ἃ 

qNom.after ἐδύνατο, ἐκ 
(sc.) ἐδοὺ ; 
cf. John 
Xi. 13, 


ἐκ φυλῆς Ζαβουλὼν δώδεκα χιλιάδες * 

ἐκ φυλῆς ᾿Ιωσὴφ δώδεκα χιλιάδες ᾿ς 

ἐκ φυλῆς Βενιαμεὶν δώδεκα χιλιάδες - ἐσφραγισμένοι. 

ΜΕΤΑ ταῦτα εἶδον ὄχλον πολύν,͵ ὃν ἀριθμῆσαι " αὐτὸν οὐδεὶς: 
“ παντὸς ἔθνους καὶ φυλῶν καὶ λαῶν καὶ “ γλωσσῶν, 


» ἑστῶτες ἐνώπιον τοῦ θρόνου καὶ ἐνώπιον τοῦ ἀρνίου, περιβεβλη- 


4 , .-“Ἔ 4 
Lev.xxiii. μένους στολὰς λευκάς, καὶ “ φοίνικες ἐν ταῖς χερσὶν adTay* το. καὶ 


40. 


rSeeonxix. κράζουσιν φωνῇ μεγάλῃ λέγοντες, 


1 and xii. 
10. 
Biv ὙΠ ΧΙ, ἐν τὰ 
10, χῖχ. 1, ἄρνιῷ. 
ἔν. 11-12. 
u Cf. Win. 
§ 13. 20. 
v xi. 16. 


”? 


a τ ΄, αἰ ἃς ae Dey - , ον ~ , A ig err 
Η "σωτηρία "τῷ Θεῷ ἡμῶν τῷ καθημένῳ ἐπὶ τῷ θρόνῳ καὶ “τῷ 


ε ΕΣ ε A 
11. ‘Kat πάντες ot ἄγγελοι " εἱστήκεισαν κύκλῳ Tod θρόνου καὶ 
ἐν κ a , Ν “- 
τῶν πρεσβυτέρων καὶ τῶν τεσσάρων ζῴων, καὶ ἥ ἔπεσαν ἐνώπιον τοῦ 


1 Read, for καὶ t. οχλος πολυς, the οχλον πολυν of A, vg., Me., Aeth., Cypr., Pr. 
(Lach.) [Syr. = κι p. T. εἰδον οχλυν trodvy ον, κ-τ.λ.]. 


origin of ἜΘΗ This sinister repu- 
tation (cf. A.C. 171-174, Selwyn 200-204, 
Erbes 77 f.), current long before Irenzeus’ 
day, rested on the haggadic interpretation 
of passages like Gen. xlix. 17; Deut. xxxiil. 
22: and Jer. viii. 16. Andreas, comment- 
ing on xvi. 12, thinks that Antichrist will 
probably come from Persia, ἔνθα ἡ φυλὴ 
τοῦ Δάν. 

Ver. ο. ἔθν. κ. φ. curious and irregular 
change from singular to plural. ἑστῶτες 
=erect, confident, triumphant. For the 
white robes, see on vi. 11 (the number of 
the martyrs being now completed). Cer- 
tain religious processions in Asia Minor 
consisted of boys robed in white and 
bearing crowns of leafy boughs (Deissm. 
368 f.); and in some Asiatic inscriptions 
νίκη is associated with the palm branch, 
which in one case is placed alongside of 
the meta or goal (C. B. P, ii. 496). The 
carrying of palm-branches was a sign of 
festal joy in the Greek and Roman (= 
victory at the games Liv. x. 47, Verg. Aen. 
v. 109), as well as in the Jewish world (1 
Macc. xiii. 51; 2 Macc. x. 7), accom- 
panied by the wearing of wreaths of 


green leaves. For the robes, see Liv. 
xxiv. 10: ‘ Hadriae aram in coelo, spe- 
ciesque hominum circum eam cum can- 
dida ueste visas esse”. Here=“scilicet 
de antichristo triumphales ” (Tertullian). 
For the numberless multitude, see Enoch 
xxxix. 6, where ‘‘ the righteous and the- 
elect shall be for ever and ever without 
number before” the messiah, in the 
mansions of bliss; white raiment and 
crowns of palm in Herm. Sim. viii. 2-4. 

Ver. ro. “Salvation” (or, if ἡ be 
pressed, the salvation we enjoy) be as- 
cribed ‘‘ to our God and to the Lamb ”. 
The subordinate nature of the seven 
spirits (i. 4, iv. 5) is shown by the fact 
that no praise is offered to them through- 
out the Apocalypse, although in Iranian 
theology (Bund. xxx. 23): ‘‘ all men be- 
come of one voice and praise aloud 
Atharmazd and the archangels in the- 
renovated universe”. 

Vv. 11-12. The angels standing around 
once again adore God, catching up the- 
previous praise with ‘‘Amen,” and utter- 
ing a sevenfold ascription of praise upon. 
their own behalf, closed with another 


5—I4. 


ATIOKAAY¥VIZ IOQANNOY 


509 


θρόνου ἐπὶ τὰ πρόσωπα αὐτῶν καὶ προσεκύνησαν τῷ Θεῷ, 12. λέ- w Initial 


Amen, 
γοντες, ; Xix. 4, 
wii? , ε > , © ἃ , wars ᾿ς , n-fe > , XX1l. 20. 
Αμήν " ἡ εὐλογία καὶ ἡ δόξα καὶ ἡ * σοφία καὶ ἡ εὐχαριστία x C/. v. 12; 
ae Χ ‘ εἰ δύ ᾿ξ Σ ‘ SVQEGIMILG > . 2A σ. and 
καὶ ἡ τιμὴ καὶ ἡ δύναμις καὶ ἡ "ἰσχὺς τῷ Θεῷ ἡμῶν εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας ἐν 
ns ΕἸ ob xii. 13 
τῶν αἰώνων. duny.” (cf. Dan. 
Ξὶ ii. 20). 
13. Καὶ “ ἀπεκρίθη εἷς ἐκ τῶν πρεσβυτέρων λέγων μοι, “Οὗτοι ν asin z 
Chron. 
ot περιβεβλημένοι τὰς στολὰς Tas λευκάς, τίνες εἰσὶν Kal πόθεν xxix ih, 
a ’ z Constr. 
ἦλθον ;”’ 14. καὶ "εἴρηκα αὐτῷ, “Κύριέ μου, σὺ " οἶδας ᾿. Kat” pratt. si. 
- ΞΟ ΔΓ] , a , a 25, Cant. 
εἶπέ μοι, “Οὗτοί εἰσιν οἱ ἐρχόμενοι “ ἐκ τῆς θλίψεως τῆς μεγάλης, Ὁ 
a Aoristic 
εν. 7. 


b Ezek. xxxvii. 3, Job xxi. 15. 


“Amen”. The article is repeated before 
each substitute, asin v, 13. The divine 
‘wisdom ” is shown in the means devised 
by the divine power to redeem (v. 12) and 
deliver (vii. 14) men, in straits where no 
human prudence could prevail. See 
Clem. Rom. lx. and Ps. Sol. xvii. 25. 

Ver. 13. ‘* And one of the elders ad- 
dressed me, saying”; for similar open- 
ings of a dialogue, see Jer. i. 11, 
Zech. iv.2. Perhaps, like Dante (Parad. 
iv. 10-12), John although silent showed 
desire painted on his face. The form 
of inquiry resembles Homer’s τίς πόθεν 
εἷς ἀνδρῶν; πόθι τοι πόλις, or Vergil’s 
qui genus? unde domo?, more closely 
still the similar sentences which recur 
in Hermas. See throughout, Zech. iv. 
1,6, and Asc. Isa. ix. 25, 26 (and I said 
to the angel ‘‘ For whom are these robes 
and thrones and crowns reserved?” 
And he said to me: ‘They shall be 
missed by many who believe the words 
of him of whom I told thee [i.e., Anti- 
christ]” ; also xi. 40, uos autem uigilate in 
sancto spiritu ut recipiatis stolam uestram 
et thronos et coronas gloriae in caelo 
iacentes). It is the origin and character, 
not the number, of the company which 
interests the prophet. 

Ver. 14. κύριέ pov (“ Sir”) the re- 
spectful address of an inferior to his 
superior in age or station, the πρεσβύτεροι 
being conceived as angelic beings (as in 
Dan. x. 17, 19, 4 Esd, iv. 3, etc.).—‘* Thou 
knowest ” (and I fain would know also). 
The great distress is plainly the period of 
persecution and martyrdom (vi. 11) pre- 
dicted (¢.g., Matt. xxiv. 21, from Dan xii.1) 
to herald the final catastrophe. It is still 
expected by Hermas (Vis. ii. 2. 7, iv. 2. 
5, 3. 6) ; but he less religiously attributes 
the white garments (i.e., purity of soul) 
to the virtues. As the crisis with its 
outcome of faith and loyalty in all 
nations (ver. 9) is to be world-wide, this 


c Contrast Rom. ii. 8-9, and compareApoc. iii. 10. 


passage seems to imply, although in a 
characteristically vague and incidental 
fashion (cf. v. 9, xiv. 6, etc.), the idea of 
Mark xiii.1o. But the situation of the 
Apocalypse is so acute, that mission 
operations are at a standstill. Instead of 
the gospel invading and pervading the 
pagan world, the latter has closed in 
upon the churches with threatening 
power, and in the brief interval before the 
end practically nothing can be looked. 
for except the preservation of the faithful. 
Those *“* who come out of the great dis- 
tress” are further described as having 
washed their robes and made them white 
in the blood of the Lamb; which por- 
trays their character and conduct and at the 
same time explains the secret of theit 
triumphant endurance. ‘‘ Mehr gedacht 
als geschaut ist das Bild” (J. Weiss). 
The great thing is not to emerge from. 
trial, but to emerge from it with un- 
stained faith and conscience. And this 
is possible, not to man’s unaided efforts, 
but to the sacrificial power of Christ, the 
experience of which forms the last line of 
defence in the struggle. The confessors. 
and martyrs owed their moral purity to 
what they obtained through the sacrifice 
of Jesus. But moral purity became in 
this case something more intense (as 
the context and the emphatic language 
of this verse imply) than the normal 
Christian experience of forgiveness and 
holiness. By a turn of thought which 
is developed later by Ignatius and Ter- 
tullian (Scorp. xii. sordes quidem baptis- 
mate abluuntur, maculae uero martyrio 
candidantur), it is suggested that in their 
martyrdom (cf. Dan. xii. 10) these saints 
were able to make the redeeming power 
of Jesus peculiarly their own ; the nature 
of their cruel sufferings identified them es- 
pecially with their Lord. It is noticeable 
that the mystic union of the individual. 
Christian with Christ mainly comes for- 


VII 


Ξ καῦμα * 


ἱ ποιμανεῖ αὐτούς, 


400 ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ ITQANNOY 
d Reward καὶ €m\uvay Tas στολὰς αὐτῶν Kal ἐλεύκαναν αὐτὰς ἐν τῷ αἵματι 
and glory _ 
(c.g. Jer. τοῦ ἀρνίου. 
XXXi. g- 5, ‘2 ἢ fe 
12);Lev- 15. “ διὰ τοῦτό εἰσιν ἐνώπιον τοῦ θρόνου τοῦ Θεοῦ, 
1{π1Ὸ privi- ‘ , yy ee Ee κῆ» \ Q 2 a A > Phi 
lege καὶ λατρεύουσιν αὐτῷ ἡμέρας καὶ νυκτὸς ἐν TO ναῷ αὐτοῦ 
(Deut. x. ὩΣ ἑ Pert μ᾿ Ξ t - ἀχὸ αν Ὲ 
8, etc., cf. καὶ 6 καθήμενος ἐπὶ τοῦ θρόνου ἦ σκηνώσει ἐπ᾽ αὐτούς. 
Ps, Sol. ii. 2 , »” Θ᾽ " , + 
40). 16. οὐ πεινάσουσιν ἔτι, οὐδὲ διψήσουσιν Ett, 
ἜΣ Xi. 19, Ε οὐδὲ μὲ , ἐπ᾿ αὐτοὺς ὁ RX ade a 
xxii. 3 οὐδὲ μὴ πέσῃ ἐπ᾽ αὐτοὺς 6 ἥλιος, οὐδὲ πᾶν 
(wor- a 
ship). 17. ὅτι τὸ ἀρνίον τὸ ἀνὰ pecov! τοῦ θρόνου 
f Divine nA 
ean kat © ὁδηγήσει αὐτοὺς ἐπὶ " ζωῆς πηγὰς * ὑδάτων, 
and proe 
tection, 


Ps. Sol. vii. 1,5; cf. xxi. 3, John i. 14, also Lev. xxvi. 11, Isa. iv. 5, Ezek. xxxvii. 27, etc. 
i Ezek. xxxiv. 23, Ps. xxili. 1, John x. 1f.; not Death, 


cxxi. 6; from Isa. xlix. ro. ἢ xvi. 9. 


Clem. Rom. li. 


k xxi. 6, xxii. 1, 17, John iv. 


g Pa: 


10, vii. 8 (Jer. ii. 13), Cant. iv. 15. 


lava μεσον, the true reading, is not a subtle allusion to mediatorship (Abbott, 
198-199) but a loose synonym for ev peow (cf. Weymouth, Fourn. Philol., 1869, ii. 
318-322): the ζωσας of min., Me., Syr. (ζωὴν και ἐπι S.) is a correction of the orig. 
gen. of quality {wns (MSS., edd.), which is thrown to the front (like σαρκος in 


I Pet. iii. 21) for emphasis. 


ward in the Apocalypse (¢f. xiv. 13) when 
the martyrs and confessors are men- 
tioned, as if the writer held that such an 
experience alone could yield the deepest 
consciousness of communion with One 
who was conceived essentially as a Lamb 
who had been slain, a faithful witness, 
etc. (cf. Titius, 216, 217). On the high 
respect for martyrs, of which this forms 
an early trace, see Weinel, 142-144. At 
the same time it is to ‘he blood of the 
Lamb, not to their own blood, that they 
owe their bliss and triumph; redemption, 
not martyrdom, is the essential basis of 
their deliverance. People might be re- 
deemed without becoming martyrs ; as, 
for example, either recreant Christians or 
those who happened to die a natural 
death. But no one could be a martyr 
without having the strength of redemp- 
tion behind him. 

Ver. 15. Ritual as well as pastoral 
traits from the O.T. fill out the concep- 
tion of this final bliss with its favoured 
position (ἐνώπ. θρόν.). Note the singular 
tenderness of the oxymoron—je that 
sitteth on the throne (the majestic al- 
mighty God) shall overshadow them 
with a presence of brooding, intimate, 
care ; followed by ποιμανεῖ here (as op- 
posed to ii. 27) in its literal sense of 
tender shepherding on the part of Jesus. 
The messiah as shepherd was an ancient 
-and familiar conception. This verse is 
partly adapted from Enoch xlv. 4-6. 
Unlike Johni. 14, it reflects a Christian 
fulfilment of the Jewish anticipation (cf. 
xiii. 6, xxi. 3; Zech. ii. ro f.; Sir. xxiv. 


8 f.) that the Shekinah would return in 
the era of final bliss. 

Ver. 16. οὐ μή with both fut. indica- 
tive and subjunctive (=ii. 11), in emphatic 
assertions. For the absence of scorching 
as a trait of the Hellenic Utopia, cf. 
Dieterich, 31-33. If καῦμα corresponds 
here to the sense of the Isaianic equiva- 
lent καύσων, the reference is to the 
scorching sirocco. Sothe Egyptian dead 
yearned for a cooling breeze in the next 
world—* Let me be placed by the edge 
of the water with my face to the north, 
that the breeze may caress me, and my 
heart be refreshed from its sorrows ” 
(see Maspero, Dawn of Civil. p. 113). 

Ver. 17. {wis goes with ὑδάτων 
(“living waters”) though prefixed for 
emphasis, like σαρκὸς in 1 Peter iii. 21 
(cf. xvi. 3 πᾶσα ψυχὴ ζωῆς) ; a favourite 
Johannine idea. In Enoch xilii, xlviii, 
the fountains contain wisdom which 
is drunk by all the thirsty, though in 
the centre there is also ‘“‘a fountain of 
righteousness which was inexhaustible” ; 
elsewhere in the division of Sheol assigned 
to the spirits of the righteous there is ‘‘a 
bright spring of the water of life” (xxii, 9) 
in accordance with the Pythagorean 
belief that the dead suffered from thirst 
in the underworld (Luke xvi. 24, cf. 
Dieterich, 97 f.). [π the familiar vignette 
of ancient Egyptian eschatology, the de- 
ceased kneels before Osiris who pours out 
to him the water of life (the motto being 
that the soul may live); cf. Renouf’s 
“ Hibb. Lect.,” p. 141, and for “living ” 
waters as divine, R. 5. 127. In the ideal 


15—17. VIII. 1—2. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ [QANNOY 


401 


καὶ ᾿ἐξαλείψει ὁ Θεὸς πᾶν "᾿ δάκρυον ἐκ τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν; Isa. xxv. 8. 


αὐτῶν. 
WALI. 


[] 8 3 “- 3 ~ ε ς , 
σιγὴ ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ ὡς ἡμιώρον. 2. 


m Form (cf. 
XXi. 4) of 
om. 


KAI ὅταν "ἤνοιξε τὴν σφραγῖδα τὴν ἑβδόμην, ἐγένετο peculiar 


to Apoc. 

in N.T. 
a orav irreg. 

equiv. for 


Kat εἶδον τοὺς “ἑπτὰ ἀγγέ- 


ὅτε (Blass, § 65, 9): indic. with ὅταν (iv. 9, Mark ii. 20, Luke xiii. 28); a relative clause conditional 


in form but definite in force (Burton, 316). 
c En. xx., Luke i. 19, etc. 


realm of the good Shepherd-King Yima, 
Iranian belief saw neither hunger nor 
thirst for the faithful, and found no place 
for death (cf. Apoc. xxi. 4) or falsehood 
(Apoc. xxi. 8) of any kind (passages and 
parallels in Boéklen, 133 f.).—é68nyyoe, 
a touch of local colour for Asiatic Chris- 
tians, since sheep and shepherds were a 
common feature in the Lycos valley (C. B. 
P.i. 40-42); but the heaven of the Apo- 
calypse is, in Semitic fashion, pastoral or 
civic, with touches of Babylonian splen- 
dour, unlike some later apocalypses, e.g., 
that of Peter (15 ἢ) where the Hellenic 
conception of Gods garden in the next 
world predominates (Dieterich, 19 f.).— 
Briggs explains the variants σκηνώσει 
ἐπ᾽ αὐτούς (vii. 15) and ox. μετ᾽ αὐτῶν 
(xxi. 3), ἀπὸ τῶν ὀφθ. (xxi. 4) and ἐκ τῶν 
66. (vii. 17) as variant translations of 


jw OANA and OM ; but, 
like ἐπὶ τὸ μέτωπον (xiii. 16), ἐπὶ τῶν 
μετώπ. (vii. 3, etc.), these are probably 
nothing more than rhetorical variations. 
Unlike the synoptic tradition (e.g., Matt. 
ii. 6) and the fourth Gospel (x. 1, 18), the 
Apocalypse confines Christ’s shepherding 
to the future life (see also ii. 26, 27). In 
Isa. liii. 6, 7, the wayward roving habits 
of sheep express the temper of God’s 
people, whilst the patient submissiveness 
of a lamb for sacrifice denotes the func- 
tion of God’s servant; in the Apocalypse, 
the latter (not the former) occurs. The 
saints are God’s flock in heaven, not on 
earth (contrast 1 Peter ii, 25, v. 2 f.). 

Whatever elements have been em- 
ployed in the following series (viii.-xi.) of 
trumpet-visions, no adequate data exist 
to prove that John has edited a Jewish 
or Jewish-Christian source here any more 
than in vi. The vision, which forms the 
result of the breaking of the seventh seal 
(viii. 1, 2), opens, after a prelude (2-5), in 
viii. 6 and does not close till xi. 19 (cf. 
viii. 5). 

CuapTer VIII.—Ver. 1. The opening 
of the seventh seal is followed by half an 
hour’s silence in heaven: ‘‘ he opened” 
looks back to vi. 12, the absence of sub- 
ject showing that vii. is a parenthesis 


b 4 Esd. vii. 29 f., Zech. ii. 13 (17), Hab. ii. 20. 


foreign to the seal-series in its original 
shape. Probably this series, like each of 
the others, was originally a separate 
oracle upon the latter days. When 
woven by the author into his large work, 
they suffered a literary treatment which 
has interrupted but ‘not altogether ob- 
literated their original form and sequence. 
The book of destiny is now open; what 
follows (vill. 6 f.) is the course of the 
future, which naturally corresponds at 
some points to the predictions already 
sketched proleptically in chap. vi. A 
brief interval, not of exhaustion but of 
expectation, of breathless suspense (a 
pause in the ecstasy, LXX of Dan. iv. 16), 
ushers in a preliminary series of judicial 
plagues heralded by seven tru npet-blasts 
(viii. 2-xi. 19). Half an hour (ἧμ., cf. 
Win. § 5, 22 a for form) may have been 
an ominous period; Josephus (B. F. vi. 5, 
§ 3) describes a portent at the siege οἱ 
Jerusalem which consisted of a bright 
light shining at twilight for half an hour, 
and the collocation of silence with rever- 
ence is illustrated by the LXX version 
(εὐλαβείσθω πᾶσα σάρξ) of Zech. xii. 13 
and Zeph.i.7f. The following trumpet- 
series has been woven into the frame of 
the work by the device of making it take 
the place of the climax which (after vi. 
17, vii. I, 2) one would naturally expect 
to occur at this point. .When the dé- 
nouement should take place, nothing 
happens; the judgment is adjourned. 
Ver. 2. ‘* The sevenangels who stand 
before God” are introduced as familiar 
figures (cf.Lueken 36f., R.F. 319 ἢ); they 
belonged to pre-Christian Judaism (Tobit 
xii. 15, “1 am Raphael, one of the seven 
holy angels, which present the prayers. 
of the saints, and go in before the glory 
of the Holy One”), and are associated 
with trumpets (1 Thess. iv. 16). Accord- 
ing to the Targ. on 2 Chron. xxxiii. 13 
when Manasseh prayed, all the angels who. 
superintend the entrance of prayers went 
and closed every approach, to prevent 
his petition reaching heaven ; in Chag. 
13 ὃ the prayers of the righteous are. 
offered by Sandalphon (cf. Longfellow’s- 
Sandalphon, and contrast Heb. vii. 25). 


AITOKAAY¥VIZ LQANNOY 


VIII. 


3. καὶ “ἄλλος ἄγγελος ἦλθε Kal ἐστάθη ΄ ἐπὶ τοῦ 


A a - , i 
ταῖς προσευχαῖς τῶν ἁγίων ᾿ πάντων ἐπὶ τὸ 


4. καὶ ἀνέβη ὃ 


ταῖς προσευχαῖς τῶν ἁγίων ἐκ χειρὸς τοῦ 
ς. καὶ "᾿ εἴληφεν ὁ ἄγγελος τὸν λιβα- 


h Dat. commodi? 


i ; n cf. Moult. i. 
k Num. iv. 11, inner altar of incense. é. 


402 
dx Thess. λους oft ἐνώπιον τοῦ Θεοῦ ἑστήκασι, καὶ ἐδόθησαν αὐτοῖς ἑπτὰ 
iv. 16, I 
Cor. xv. 4 σάλπιγγες. 
2, Matt. ; = wile he ΟΝ ΠΩΣ : 
xxiv. 31, θυσιαστηρίου, ἔχων λιβανωτὸν ὅ χρυσοῦν καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῷ θυμιά- 
4 Esd. ν. 
4, Vi. 23; ματα πολλά, ἵνα δώσει ἢ 
cf. Josh. κθ , x “ ΟῚ ΡΣ A) , 
vi. 4, Jer. " θυσιαστήριον τὸ χρυσοῦν τὸ ἐνώπιον τοῦ ᾿ θρόνου. 
iv. 19 ΗΝ 
Zephi. καπνὸς τῶν θυμιαμάτων ἢ 
15-16. > ’ yee J A A 
e As vii.2. ἀγγέλου ἐνώπιον τοῦ Θεοῦ. 
f iii. 20, vii. 
I, etc. (= ἵ ἢ is Sn 
“at altar of burnt offering”) Amos ix. 1. g 1 Kings vii. 50. 
75. = “in aid of". i Cf. Win. § 20, 11f. 
God (ix. 13). m Aoristic pf., v. 7. 


1 The variants 8woy and $w are corrections of the original δωσει (NAC, 1, edd.) 
—.va with fut. indic. as iii. 9, etc. (Win. § 5, 17, ὃ 13, 7, § 14, 9)- 


This septet of distinguished angels be- 
longs to the circle of ideas behind i. 4, iv. 
5, v. 6; but the author as usual prefers 
vividness and variety to homogeneity. He 
uses them for minatory purposes, assign- 
ing to “another angel” their character- 
istic function (ver. 3) in Jewish tradition. 
The alteration of figure at this point is 
deliberate. The certainty of divine de- 
crees is suggested by the figure of seals; 
but now that the prophet is describing 
the promulgation of the actual events 
presaged in the book of Doom, he, like 
the author of 4 Esdras (? cf. Lat. of v. 4), 
employs the figure of angels with trum- 
pets of hostile summons and shattering 
alarm. The final series (xv.-xvi.) in 
which these decrees are executed, is aptly 
described under the figure of bowls or 
vials drenching the earth with their bitter 
contents (cf. Bovon, Nouv. Test. Théol. ii. 
503). The trumpet, as a signal for war, 
is naturally associated with scenes of judg- 
ment (reff.). ‘‘ Power, whether spiritual 
or physical, is the meaning of the trumpet, 
and so, well used by Handel in his ap- 
proaches to the Deity” (E. Fitzgerald’s 
Letters, i.92). Trumpet to lip, the angels 
now stand ready. They are set in motion 
by a significant interlude (3-5). 

Ver. 3. Between royalty and ritual the 
scenery of the Apocalypse fluctuates. 
It is assumed (as at vi. 9), after vii. 15 
perhaps, that heaven isa temple, although 
this is not expressly stated till xi. 19; 
nor is it homogeneous with the throne- 
description in chap. iv. λιβανωτόν 
(‘‘ incense,” Gm. Aey. N.T.) is used by 
mistake for the classical ABavwrpiv(LXX, 
πυρίε]ιον or θυίσκη) = “censer,” as al- 
ready in an inscription of the second 
century B.c. (Dittenberger’s Sylloge In- 
script. Graec. 588 155) λιβανωτίς is em- 
ployed by confusion for ‘“ frankincense”. 


Golden censers (1 Macc. i. 22) and golden 
bowls (φιάλαι) were among the furniture 
of the temple (1 Esd. ii. 13). On prayers 
as an Offering, see Acts x. 4. The sym- 
bolism is borrowed from the temple- 
ritual; when the saucer of incense had 
been emptied over the burning coals 
placed on the altar of incense, the people 
bowed in prayer, as the fragrant cloud of 
smoke rose up. Wellhausen’s deletion 
of 3 ὃ, 4asa gloss is therefore unneces- 
sary. John is consoling the church (cf. 
on vi. 10) by the assurance that their 
prayers for the coming of the kingdom 
are not breathed in vain. 

Ver. 4. As an agent of God, the angel 
is commissioned to ratify with Divine 
approval the petitions of the saints for 
the end; this involves retribution on the 
impenitent and hostile world. The pro- 
phet is sure such aspirations are in har- 
mony with God’s will. 

Ver. 5. The censer, having offered 
incense to heaven, is now used to hurl 
fire upon the earth (adopted from Ezek. 
x. 2-7; cf. Lev. xvi. 12). As at the close 
of the trumpets (xi. 19) and the bowls 
(xvi. 18), physical disturbances here ac- 
company the manifestation of God’s 
wrath and judgment. In answer to the 
prayers and longings of the saints(Renan, 
393), God at last visits the impenitent 
pagan world with a series of catastrophes 
(vili., ix., cf. ix. 4), which herald the end 
and also give (though in vain, ix. 20, 21) 
an opportunity for repentance. 

Note on viii. 3-5. This episode (in 
dumb show) of angel and incense, though 
apparently isolated, is an overture for the 
seri-s of judgments, of which the suc- 
cessive trumpet-blasts are precursors. 
The prayers of all the saints, which, like 
those of the martyrs in vi. 10, crave 
punishment upon God’s enemies through- 


3—6. 


AIIOKAAYY¥VIZ LOQANNOY 


403 


‘ ΔΝ , Pera | > a Ν A ΄ νν» A 
ψωτὸν καὶ ἐγέμισεν αὐτὸν ἐκ TOU πυρὸς TOU θυσιαστηρίου καὶ ἔβαλεν ἃ vi. 13. 


ο Exod. xix. 


" εἰς τὴν ἢ γῆν" Kai ὃ ἐγένοντο Bpovrai! καὶ φωναὶ καὶ ἀστραπαὶ καὶ 16, Ezek. 


σεισμός. 


6. Καὶ οἱ ἑπτὰ ἄγγελοι ἔχοντες τὰς ἢ ἑπτὰ σάλπιγγας ἡτοίμασαν 


X12. 

p Seven 
trumpets 
in Levi- 
tical 
orchestra, 

Neh, xii. 41, etc. 


1Bpovrat kat αστραπαι kat φωναι A, 16, 38, Me., Syr. (Lach., WH marg., Al., 


Ws.), text SQ, min., vg., Arm., S., Ande, 


out the earth, are supported and rein- 
forced by the ministry ot this angel, and 
answered at once by the succession of 
incidents beginning with ver. 5. This 
object of Christian prayers, 7.e., the final 
crisis, when Christ returns to crush his 
enemies and inaugurate his reign, per- 
vaded early Christianity as a whole. At 
special periods of intolerable persecution, 
it assumed under the stress of antagon- 
ism as herea more sensuous and plastic 
form than the ordinary consciousness of 
the church would have been usually dis- 
posed to cherish ; yet the common prayer 
of the church in any case was for the 
speedy end of the world (ἐλθέτω χάρις 
καὶ παρελθέτω ὁ κόσμος οὗτος, Did. x.). 
In Apoc. Mos. (tr. Conybeare, $ewish 
Quart. Rev., 1895, 216-235) xxxiii., when 
the angels intercede for Adam at his 
ascension to heaven, they take golden 
censers and offer incense; whereupon 
smoke overshadows the very firmament. 
The intercession of angels on behalf of 
the saints, a result of their function as 
guardians, goes back to post-exilic Judaism 
with its inarticulated conception of the 
angels as helpful to mankind (Job v. 1. 
xxxili. 23; Zech. i, 12); subsequently 
the idea developed into a belief that the 
prayers of the pious won special efficacy 
as they were presented to God by angels 
such as Gabriel, Raphael, Michael, or 
the seven archangels (cf. Tobit, loc. cit. ; 
Slav. En. vii. 5; En. ix. 2-11, xv. 2, xl. 6, 
xlvii. 2, xcix. 3, 16, civ. 1). In Christi- 
anity this r6le was naturally absorbed by 
Christ, who alone ratified and inspired 
his people’s supplications. But the old 
belief evidently lingered in pious circles 
of Jewish Christianity (cf. Test. Lev. 3, 
5), side by side with a complete accept- 
ance of Christ’s heavenly function. The 
latter did not immediately or universally 
wither up such survivals of the older 
faith; popular religion tended then as 
now to be wider at several points than 
its theoretical principles (as in Origen, 
Cels. v, 4;.and Tertull. de Orat. xii.). 
Plato, in Sympos. 202 E., makes the 


Pre εἴο (lilt, ΝΗ, Β]:, Sw., Bs.). 


δαίμονες present men’s prayers and offer- 
ings to the gods, and mediate the latter’s 
commands and recompence to men (cf. 
Philo, de Somniis, i. 22, and on i. 1). 
See further xvii. I, xxi. 9, for a similar 
state of matters in primitive Christianity 
with regard to the corresponding function 
of Jewish angels as intermediaries of 
revelation. 

Ver. 6f. The fresh series of disasters 
does not advance matters any further 
than the previous seal-series. Both lead 
up to the final catastrophe, and upon the 
edge of it melt into a further develop- 
ment which practically goes over the 
same ground once more. This reflects 
of course literary artifice, not any succes- 
sive or continuous scheme of events; it 
is iterative not historically chronolo- 
gical. It is doubtful if the prophet in- 
tended to suggest the idea which occurs 
to a modern mind, viz., that such appa- 
rent cycles seem to recur in history. At 
cettain epochs everything seems to be 
working up to some mighty climax for 
which men look in dread or hope, and 
yet the world rights itself for another 
epoch; the dénouement fades for the 
time being into the far horizon; the 
powers of evil gather themselves afresh 
in other forms. Neither here nor in the 
previous seven cycles can the astrological 
reference (to the colours and character- 
istics of the planets, cp. Exp. Ti. xx. 426- 
427) be worked out with any plausibility. 

Vv. 6-12. The first four trumpets. 

Ver. 6. Inthe scheme of the trumpet- 
visions, as of the seal-visions, the first 
four are differentiated from the next 
three; the fifth and sixth in both cases 
stand by themselves and are separated 
by a considerable interlude from the clos- 
ing seventh. It is remarkable that even 
the final trumpet of xi. 15 f. does not cor- 
respond to the loud trumpet-blast which 
according to Jewish and early Christian 
tradition, was to awaken the dead to 
resurrection or to rally the saints (Matt. 
xxiv. 31) at the close of the world. The 
Apocalypse knows nothing of this fea- 


404 


s . ςε a a ’ 
4 xi.19,xvi. αὑτοὺς ἵνα σαλπίσωσι. 
21 only, ἴῃ 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


VIiw. 


7. Καὶ 6 πρῶτος ἐσάλπισεν, καὶ. 


N.T. See ἐγένετο “χάλαζα καὶ “ πῦρ μεμιγμένα ἐν " αἵματι, καὶ ἐβλήθη εἰς. 


Ovid's 4 x 
Met.xv. THVv ν᾿ 
788, Exod. se 


ix. 24, Isa. ὅρων KATEKAN, Kal πᾶς χόρτος χλωρὸς κατεκάη. 


XXVill. 2, 
Ps. xviii. 


πος , a A , ΟΣ ἄγ | , a ἐς 
και TO τριτον THS ys κατεκαάη; καὶ TO τριτον των δέν- 


8. Καὶ & 


δεύτερος ἄγγελος ἐσάλπισεν, “Kal ὡς ὄρος μέγα πυρὶ καιόμενον. 


ἸΟϑάαν, ἐβλήθη εἰς τὴν θάλασσαν ᾿ καὶ ἐγένετο τὸ τρίτον τῆς θαλάσσης 


9, LXX 
s Ezek. 


XXXVili. 
22, Joel 
ii. 30 (iii. 
3)- ᾿ς 

t 4 Esd. v. 8, Isa. il. 13. 
20-21. 
y Irreg. as ix. 12, 18. 


ture, nor of the tradition (preserved by R. 
Akiba) that the process of the resurrec- 
tion would be accompanied by seven 
trumpet-peals from God. The first four 
trumpets set in motion forces of ruin that 
fall on natural objects; in Sap. v. 17-23 
(xvi. 17-24) the world of nature is used 
directly by God to punish men. The 
closing three concern human life, i.e., the 
godless inhabitants of the earth. The 
general idea is that of the Jewish tradition 
(see on xv. 2) which prefaced the second 
great redemption by disasters analogous 
to those preceding the first: cf. e.g., 
Sohar Exod. 4 b, tempore quo se reuelabit 
rex Messias, faciet Deus omnia ista 
miracula, prodigia et divinae uirtutis opera 
coram Israele, quae fecit olim in Aegypto, 
quemadmodum scriptum est Mic. vii. 15 ; 
also Jalkut Sim. i. 56 ὃ, Targ. Jon. on 
Zech. x. 11, etc. The disasters remind 
one now and then of the Egyptian plagues 
(cf. Jos. Ant. ii. 14-1; also Amos iv. 4 f., 
Isa. ix. 7 f.). The first four visit earth, 
sea, waters, and the sky. Hail-showers 
were a traditional scourge and weapon 
of the divine armoury; on their associa- 
tion with thunderstorms see G. A. Smith’s 
Hist. Geog. 64, 65. 

Ver. 7. Hail and fire, as in the fourth 
Egyptian plague, but with the added 
O.T. horror (see reff.) of a shower of 
blood instead of rain (see Chag. 12 ὦ, 
where the sixth heaven is the storehouse 
of hail, storm, and noxious vapours, en- 
closed within gates of fire; and specially 
Sibyll. v. 377, wip yap am οὐρανῶν . .. 
βρέξει. .. πῦρ καὶ αἷμα). For similar 
atmospheric phenomena, see on vi. 8, 12. 
Portents of this abnormal nature are re- 
corded for the seventh decade of the first 
century by Roman historians, but there 
is no need to see specific historical allu- 
sions in prophecy upon this grand scale. 
The sight of atmospheric fire always 
signified to the ancients the approach of 


Ὁ En. xviii. 13 f., xxi. 3, cviii. 4, from Jer. ii. 25? 
w False apposition (ii. 20, etc.) or ptc. used (Weiss) as a relative clause. 


Yatpa, 9. καὶ ἀπέθανε τὸ τρίτον τῶν κτισμάτων τῶν ἐν τῇ θαλ- 
άσσῃ, τὰ “ ἔχοντα ψυχάς, καὶ τὸ τρίτον τῶν " πλοίων 7 διεφθάρησαν. 


v Exod. vii- 
x Isa. ii. 16. 


various disasters, especially when stars 
fell. Wetstein cites Bara Mezia, 59, τ; 
dixit R. Eliezer, percussus est mundus, 
tertia mempe pars olearum, tertia pars 
tritici, et tertia hordei. The third is a 
primitive Semitic (Babylonian: Jastrow, 
107 f.) division, which has its roots also 
in Iranian religion (Yasht, xiii. 3, Yasna, 
xi. 7, etc.), where the tripartite division 
of earth, derived originally from the 
threefold division of earth, atmosphere, 
and universe, is older than the seven- 
fold.—8€v8pwv, see Schol. (τὰ δένδρα. 
δηλονότι) on Thuc. ii. 19 καθεζόμενοι. 
ἔτεμνον ... τὸ πεδίον. Pausan. ii. 365 
(cf. iv. 166 f.) mentions among the pheno- 
mena attending earthquakes heavy rain. 
or prolonged drought, the discolour- 
ing of the sun’s disc, etc.; ‘springs 
mostly dry up. Sudden gusts sometimes. 
sweep over the country, blowing the 
trees down. At times, too, the sky is 
shot with sheets of flame. Stars are: 
seen of an aspect never known before, 
and strike consternation into all be- 
holders.”’ 

Vv. 8, g. A fiery mass, huge as @ 
mountain, is flung into the sea—a de- 
scription which would recall the fiery 
volcanic bombs familiar to inhabitants of 
the Egean. The catastrophe includes, as 
in the first Egyptian plague, the turning 
of water into blood and the destruction 
of marine animals (4 Esd. v. 7, Verg. 
Georg. iii. 541 f.), besides havoc among 
the shipping. Volcanic phenomena (cf. 
Introd. § 5) in the Egean archipelago (e.g., 
at Thera) are in the background of this. 
description, and of others throughout the 
book; features such as the disturbance 
of islands and the mainland, showers of 
stones, earthquakes, the sun obscured by 
a black mist of ashes, and the moon 
reddened by volcanic dust, were the natural. 
consequences of eruption in some sub- 
marine volcano, and Thera—adjoinine 


7—13. AITIOKAAYY 


10. Kat ὁ τρίτος ἄγγελος 


I= IQANNOY 405 


καὶ ἔπεσεν ἐκ: Cf. Sib. 


ἐσάλπισεν, i ‘ 
r. Vv. 158+ 


τοῦ οὐρανοῦ ἀστὴρ μέγας καιόμενος ὡς λαμπάς, καὶ ἔπεσεν ἐπὶ τὸ a xvi. 4, cf. 


’ a a ~ 
τρίτον τῶν ποταμῶν καὶ ἐπὶ τὰς "πηγὰς τῶν ὑδάτων. 


Ps. Sol. 
Xvii. 21, 
Test. 


II. καὶ τὸ 


” lol , - 
ὄνομα τοῦ ἀστέρος λέγεται ὁ ἢἤΑψινθος ᾿ καὶ “ ἐγένετο τὸ τρίτον τῶν Levi. 4. 


ὑδάτων “ εἰς ἄψινθον, καὶ 
ὑδάτων, ὅτι ἐπικράνθησαν. 


“ , “ 
ἐσάλπισεν, καὶ “ἐπλήγη τὸ τρίτον τοῦ ἡλίου καὶ τὸ τρίτον τῆς 22. 
~ aA , A 
σελήνης Kal τὸ τρίτον τῶν ἀστέρων, ἵνα σκοτισθῇ τὸ τρίτον αὐτῶν, 
ἈΝ a ε , 
Kal ἣ ἡμέρα μὴ *pdvy τὸ τρίτον αὐτῆς, καὶ ἡ νὺξ ὁμοίως. 


πολλοὶ τῶν ἀνθρώπων ἀπέθανον ἐκ τῶν 
12. “Kat ὃ τέταρτος ἄγγελος 


b Jer. ix. 15, 
XXili. 15. 

ς Luke xiii. 
19, cf. 
Win. § 29, 


d Exod. x. 
21-22; cf. 
on Vi. 12, 
with 4 
Esd. v. 4. 


13. Καὶ εἶδον, καὶ ἤκουσα ἑνὸς ἀετοῦ | πετομένου ἐν ® pEeTOUPAVMATL, @ ix λεγ. 
A ~ δ oie 
λέγοντος φωνῇ μεγάλῃ, ἢ ““ Οὐαὶ, οὐαὶ, οὐαὶ τοὺς κατοικοῦντας ἐπὶ, Cf. xviii. 


τῆς γῆς, "ἐκ τῶν λοιπῶν φωνῶν τῆς σάλπιγγος τῶν τριῶν ἀγγέλων 


τῶν μελλόντων σαλπίζειν ”. 


h Imitated in 4 Esd. xv. 14-15. 


23, Win. 
§ 13, 12. 
g xiv. 6, xix. 
17: an. 
λεγ. N.T. 


i xii. 12. k Cf. ver. 11; = ἀπό Matt. xviii. 7. 


1 The curious and inferior variant ayyeAov (P, 1, etc., Arm., Vict., And., Vitringa: 
unus ut aquilam, Pr.) probably arose from a copyist’s recollection of xiv. 6. K6n- 
necke (Emendationen zu Stellen N.T., 34-35) prefers the complete (so 13) reading 


ayyedov ws αετου. 


Patmos—was in a state of more or less 
severe eruption during the first century. 
All this suggested the hideous colours 
in which the final catastrophe was 
painted by the imagination of pious con- 
temporaries. In the eruption of 1573, 
the sea round Thera was tinted for 
twenty miles round, and even when the 
submarine volcano is quiescent, ‘‘the sea 
in the immediate vicinity of the cone is 
of a brilliant orange colour, from the 
action of oxide of iron”. In 1707 a large 
rock suddenly appeared in the sea, dur- 
ing the eruption, and owing to noxious 
vapours ‘‘all fish in the harbour died”’. 
Vv. 10, 11. The third part of all 
drinking waters is poisoned by a huge, 
noxious, torch-like meteor shooting down 
from the sky (Vergil’s “de coelo lapsa 
per umbras stella facem ducens multa 
cum luce concurrit,” Aen. ii. 693, 694). 
Wormwood, a bitter drug typical of 
divine punishment, was apparently sup- 
posed to be a mortal poison; thus Pliny 
(H. N. ii. 232) ascribes the bitterness of 
Lake Sannaus (Anava) in the Lycos 
valley to the circa nascente apsinthio. 
But this feature of the vision is taken 
from Iranian or Mandaean eschatology 
(Brandt, 584 f.), where among the signs 
of the end are famine, wars, a star falling 
from heaven and making the sea red [cf. 
Apoc. xvi. 3], and a cyclone with a dust- 
storm. Cf. 4 Esd. v. 9, et in dulcibus 
aquis salae inueniuntur. Rivers and 
fountains were associated in the ethnic 
VOL. V. 2 


=< 


mind (cf. Neh. ii. 13) with supernatural 
spirits and curative properties; hence 
upon them this stern prophet of mono- 
theism sees the doom of God falling. 
ἐγένετο. . - εἰς, a Hebraistic constr., 
common in Apocalypse and in quota- 
tions from O.T., but ‘‘ decidedly rare else- 
where’”’ in N.T. (Simcox). Springs (like 
those, ¢.g., near Smyrna) and fountains 
naturally appeared to the ancient mind 
somewhat mysterious and separate; 
their lack of visible connexion with 
rivers or lakes suggested the idea that 
they sprang from the subterranean abyss 
or that they were connected with dae- 
mons. Hence their réle in the final con- 
vulsions of nature (4 Esd. vi. 24 uenae 
fontium stabunt, Ass. Mos. x. 8 et fontes 
aquarum deficient). Cf. Rohrbach’s Im 
Lande Fahwehs und Fesu (τοοτ), 30 f.; 
for their connexion with dragons, R. S., 
157, 161 f., and for their bubbling as 
a mark of sacred energy, ibid. 154 f. 

Ver. 12. ‘‘Soasto darken a third part of 
them, and (i.e.) to prevent a third of the 
day from shining (pavy, or φανῇ, Win.) 
and of the night likewise”. Daylight is 
shortened by a third, and the brightness 
of an Eastern night correspondingly 
lessened (cf. the Egyptian plague of 
darkness). The writer either forgets or 
ignores the fact that he has already 
cleared the heaven of stars (vi. 13). 

Ver. 13. An ominous introduction to 
the last three trumpets. An eagle, here 
asin Apoc. Bar. Ixxvii. 17-22, Ixxxvii. 1 (cf. 


6 


406 


ἃ Vili. To, 
xii. 9, Isa. 
xiv. 12, 
Luke x. 
18. 


b xi. 7, xvii. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


IX. 1. ΚΑΙ ὃ πέμπτος ἄγγελος ἐσάλπισεν, καὶ εἶδον 


ΙΧ. 


" ἀστέρα ἐκ 


τοῦ οὐρανοῦ " πεπτωκότα εἰς τὴν γῆν, καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῷ ἡ κλεῖς τοῦ 
a “- μὴ 
"φρέατος τῆς ἀβύσσου, 2. καὶ ἤνοιξε τὸ φρέαρ τῆς ἀβύσσου, καὶ 


8, xx. 1,3, ἀνέβη “ καπνὸς ἐκ τοῦ φρέατος ὡς καπνὸς καμίνου μεγάλης, καὶ 


En. x 


Luke viii.“ €oxoTwOy ὁ ἥλιος Kal 6 ἀὴρ ἐκ τοῦ καπνοῦ τοῦ φρέατος. 


31,cf.Gen. Ps 
xxix. 2, ἐκ TOU 


c Gent xix. ν 
28, Exod. Tt, 
xix. 18, 
Joel ii. 2, 
10. 

ἃ xvi. το. 
Only here 
in N.T. 
in literal sense. 
in final clause. 


gi.7. h vii. 4-8. 
Rest of Words of Bar. vii.) a messenger 
and herald of catastrophe (its associations 
are punitive and bodeful, Deut. xxviii. 
49, Hos. viii. 1, Hab. i. 8, Eurip. Rhes. 
528-536) flies in the zenith, t.e., swoop- 
ing exactly over the heads of men. For 
the eagle (Simurgh in Zoroastrianism) 
as the servant of Deity in ancient (Sy- 
rian) mythology, see E. Bz. ‘‘ Cherub,” 
§ 8, and Acts of Thomas (Hymn of Soul, 
51).—‘‘ Woe . . . for the rest of the 
trumpet voices.” The first woe finishes 
at ix. 12, the second (after the interlude 
of x. I-xi. 13) at xi. 14, the third appar- 
rently at xii. 12—though as usual one 
series of phenomena melts irregularly 
at the close into another. 


CHAPTER IX.—Vv. 1-12: The jifth 
trumpet. 
Ver. 1. Stars (as σώματα ἐπουράνια) 


drop from heaven in the form of beasts 
(Enoch Ixxxvi. τ f.) and men (ibid. 
Ixxxviii.) throughout Jewish apocalyptic 
(cf. ibid. xviii. 16, xxi. 1, 6, xc. 21, 24) ; 
even earlier (Judges v. 20, Job xxxviii. 7) 
they had been personified. On falling 
stars, associated as evil portents with 
death or divine displeasure, see Frazer’s 
Golden Bough (2nd ed.), ii. 18f. From 
what follows, it is possible that this an- 
gelic being who had fallen is conceived 
as an evil agent (reff.), permitted (ἐδόθη) 
to exercise malicious power on earth in 
furtherance of divine judgment. ‘‘ The 
pit of the abyss ” is the abode of the devil 
and daemons (reff. cf. Aen. vii. 583 f., 
viii. 243 f.), a subterranean chasm or 
waste underworld, located sometimes in 
the middle of the earth (Slav. En. xxviii. 
3), and represented here (cf. xx. I) as 
covered by a lid or great stone. To 
judge from xiii. 1, this abyss seems to 
contain, as in O.T., the flow of waters 
formerly upon the earth, and now confined 
(according to Jewish folk-lore) by God's 


οὐδὲ πᾶν δένδρον, εἰ μὴ τοὺς ἀνθρώπους 5 οἵτινες οὐκ 


e Cf. Schol. on Arist. Acharn. 150. 


3. "Καὶ 


καπνοῦ ἐξῆλθον ἀκρίδες εἰς τὴν γῆν, καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτοῖς éfou- 

ὡς ἔχουσιν ἐξουσίαν οἱ σκορπίοι τῆς γῆς᾽ 4-. καὶ ἐρρέθη 
> » J A ἀὃ , Ν , ~ lol f ade f Aa Xx x 

αὐτοῖς ἵνα μὴ ἀδικήσουσιν τὸν χόρτον τῆς γῆς, ᾿ οὐδὲ ἦ πᾶν χλωρὸν, 


Ἀ ἔχουσι τὴν 


f Hebraistic -ε οὐδέν ; οὐδέ synt. irreg- 


decree and the magical potency of His 
name (cf. on xx. 4 and ii. 17 also Prayer 
of Manasseh, “‘O Lord Almighty... 
Who hast shut up the deep, τὴν a βυσσον 
and sealed it by thy terrible and glorious 
name”.) A fearsome cavity (‘ditis 
spiraculum”) emitting poisonous ex- 
halations once existed near Hierapolis 
(Pliny, H. N. ii. 95). Such chasms 
(throughout Italy, Greece and Asia) 
seemed, to the superstitious, local inlets 
into Hades and outlets for infernal air in 
the shape of mephitic vapours. In 
Phrygia itself springs of hot vapour and 
smoke are a feature of the Lycos valley 
(C. B. P. i. 2, 3), and the volcanic cone 
in the harbour of Thera was believed to 
be such an aperture of hell. Fire belch- 
ing from this subterranean furnace was a 
sure portent of the final catastrophe (4 
Esd. v. 8); cf. Renan, 330 f., 396, R. S. 
127, and Jeremias, 116 f. 

Ver. 2. For the following description 
of this destructive horde of weird locusts, 
see Joel ii. with Driver’s notes and ex- 
cursus (C. B.) to which add the famous 
description of a locust-plague in New- 
man’s Callista (ch. xv.). Naturally the 
sketch is far more idealised than that 
given by Joel; it often recalls the 
monstrous associates created by Tiamat 
out of the primeval abyss (Jastrow, pp. 
419 f.); i.e., strong warriors, ‘‘ great ser- 
pents, merciless in attack, sharp of tooth. 
With poison instead of blood she filled 
their bodies. Furious vipers she clothed 
with terror, made them high of stature." 

Vv. 3, 4. The dense smoke resolves 
itself into a swarm of infernal demons in 
the form of locusts but rendered more 
formidable by their additional power of 
stinging like scorpions. Instead of prey- 
ing on their natural food (Exod. x. 15), 
already plagued (viii. 7) they are let 
loose upon men unmarked by the Divine 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


I—7. 407 
t G "Θεοῦ ἐπὶ τῶ ύ . καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτοῖς 1 ἵνα ἱ Full 
σφραγῖδα τοῦ " Θεοῦ ἐπὶ ΤῊ μετώπων. 5 fig é wi τῳ dente 
μὴ ἀποκτείνωσιν αὐτούς, ἀλλ᾽ ἵνα βασανισθήσονται 'pivas ᾿' πέντε" pera 
, ᾿ ’ 
καὶ ὁ βασανισμὸς αὐτῶν ὡς βασανισμὸς σκορπίου, ὅταν παίσῃ April to 
ugust. 
ἄνθρωπον. k Progres 
Sy cea a ey tik , k , εν sive fut. 
6. καὶ ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις ἐκείναις " ζητήσουσιν οἱ ἄνθρωποι τὸν Burton, 
. on- 
θάνατον, trast Phil, 
1 LAS a SSS τὸ τῷ 2 eae 1. 23. 
καὶ οὐ μὴ εὕρωσιν 2 αὐτόν 1 Job iii. 21 
κ᾿ ef. viii. 3 
καὶ " ἐπιθυμήσουσιν ἀποθανεῖν, Jer 
\ , ε ee Par Anacr. 
καὶ φεύγει ὁ θάνατος ἀπ᾽ αὐτῶν. igh 
a Soph. El. 
7: Kal τὰ ὁμοιώματα τῶν ἀκρίδων ὅμοια " ἵπποις ἡτοιμασμένοις ἜΡΟΝ ἐς 
ae <a" Ovid: 
εἰς πόλεμον, Ibis 123- 
. ἐς sat 
Aesch. fr. 314, οὐ. Sib. Or. viii. 353, Herod. vii. 46, and Eur. Hipp. 1047. πὶ Joel ii. 4.) erie 


1 Read avrots (NA, 1, Pr.) as in vv. 3 and 4 (90), with Ti., Ws., Bs., Bj. (Lach. 
WH marg., Sw., ver. 5). 

3 Read ov μη (NAPQ, τ, etc., And., Areth.) evpwow (AP, min., etc.) with Lach., 
Diist., WH marg., Ws., Bs., Bj. [ευρησουσιν SQ, min., vg., Andpal, Areth., Ti., Tr. 


Al. Sw., WH]. 


seal (though the expected blast of winds 
is dropped), the idea being similar to that 
reproduced in Ps. Sol. xiii. 1-3, 4, 5, XV. 
I, 9 (see above, on vii. 3). The nations 
under command of Holofernes (Jud. ii. 
20) are also likened by the Jewish 
romancer to a swarm of innumerable 
locusts ; and from the mouth of the beast 
in Hermas issue ἀκρίδες πύριναι to per- 
secute the virgin church. Josephus, too, 
compares the army of Simeon to locusts 
(B. F. iv. 97). Why are trees (vii. 1) 
exempted? For the reason suggested 
in Ps. Sol. xi. 6, 7-? 

Ver. 5. παίσῃ here, like ἐπάταξεν 
Jas. iv. 7, represents LXX, tr. of : in 
sense of reptile’s bite; the scorpion with 
its long-fanged tail stings the prey which 
it has already gripped with its claws 
(cf. Sen. Hercul. 1218). Scorpions were 
a natural symbol for vicious and dan- 
gerous opponents (cf. Ezek. ii. 6, Luke 
x. 9), whose attacks were always painful 
and might be mortal. “The sting is 
not perilous. ... The wounded part 
throbs with numbness and aching till 
the third day, there is not much swell- 
ing” (Doughty, Ar. Des. i. 328). But 
the effects were not always so mild (Arist. 
ie IN’. ix.'20). 

Ver. 6. The withholding of death, 
instead of being an alleviation, is really 
a refinement of torture; so infernal is 
the pain, that the sufferers crave, but 
crave in vain, for death (Sibyll. iii. 208 : 
καὶ καλέσουσι καλὸν τὸ θανεῖν καὶ 
φεύξετ᾽ ἀπ᾽ αὐτῶν). It is singular that 


suicide is never contemplated, although 
it was widely prevalent at this period in 
certain circles of the Empire (see Meri- 
vale’s Romans under the Empire, ch. \xiv; 
Lecky’s Euvop. Morals, i. 212 f.). For 
its un-Jewish character see Jos. Bell. iii. 
8. 5. 

Ver. 7. Arabian poets compare locusts 
in head to the horse, in breast to the lion, 
in feet to the camel, in body to the snake, 
in antennz to a girl’s long, waving hair. 
The resemblance of the head in locusts 
and in horses has been often noticed 
(Cavalleta, Italian), and their hard scales 
resemble plates of equine armour. The 
rest of the description is partly fanciful 
(‘crowns gleaming like gold,” human 
faces; yet cf. Pl. H. N. vi. 28, Arabes 
mitrati degunt, aut intonsa crine), partly 
(vv. 8-9) true to nature (woman’s hair 
[1.6., abundant and flowing, a well-known 
trait of the Parthians and Persians], 
and lion-like teeth, scaly plates on the 
thorax, and rustling or whirring noises), 
partly (ver. 10) recapitulatory (=ver. 5; 
note ὁμοίας σκορπίοις, an abbreviated 
comparison like Homer’s κόμαι Xapi- 
Tego ὁμοῖαι), partly (ver. ey imagina- 
tive (cf. Prov. xxx. 27). The leader 
of these demons is the angel of the 
inferno from which they issue. His 
name is Abaddon (cf. Exp. Times, xx. 
234 f.), a Heb. equivalent for ἽΜῺΝ 
personified like death and Hades. The 
final syllable of the name is taken to 
represent as in Greek, a personal ending. 
Hence the LXX rendering ἀπώλεια pro- 


AIIOKAAY¥VIZ LQANNOY 


408 IX. 
o For form, καὶ ἐπὶ Tas κεφαλὰς αὐτῶν ὡς στέφανοι ὅμοιοι χρυσῷ, 

cf. X.9, xi. κι a 2A , 3 a = 

12. Ab- καὶ τὰ πρόσωπα αὐτῶν ὡς πρόσωπα ἀνθρώπων 

bott (go) 4 

compares ϑ. καὶ " εἶχαν τρίχας ὡς τρίχας γυναικῶν * 

the femi- \ oe p2ge 2A ε , s 

nine garb καὶ οἱ Ῥ ὀδόντες αὐτῶν ὡς λεόντων ἦσαν " 

of the \ os , ὡς θώ ὃ δῷ 9 

fanatics 9. καὶ εἶχον θώρακας as θώρακας σιδηροῦς 

in Jeru- bles a a 

pee καὶ ἡ “ φωνὴ τῶν πτερύγων αὐτῶν ὡς φωνὴ ἁρμάτων πολλῶν 

(Jos. Bell. , 39 aN 

Bie eal: τρεχόντων εἰς πόλεμον. 

Li. 6, 

Ῥ ρος ro, καὶ ἔχουσιν " οὐρὰς "ὁμοίας 2 σκορπίοις καὶ κέντρα, καὶ ἐν 

3D. «Tats οὐραῖς αὐτῶν ἡ ἐξουσία αὐτῶν ἀδικῆσαι τοὺς ἀνθρώπους μῆνας 
ᾳ Jer. xlvii. »*, ΕΙΣ SID Sa = Shae ας ΔΩ) 

ΠῚ Ἢ πέντε. II. ἔχουσιν ἐπ᾽ αὐτῶν βασιλέα τὸν ἄγγελον τῆς ἀβύσ- 

5. oy) ΓΕ ἐν peas SEA EE (RG Ἂς “ἊΣ πον ~ wet A 
rVer.19, σου ὄνομα αὐτῷ savin Αβαδδών,᾽᾿ καὶ ἐν τῇ * Ἑλληνικῇ 

ΧΙΪ. 4: ἅπ. # > wee? , , 

hey NT, ὄνομα EXEL cinup cud : 
5 Constr. χ- ὐὑαὶ ἡ ἢ . 

Ἐξ 12. *‘H οὐαὶ ἡ pe moilenens 

pe ἰδοὺ 7 ἔρχεται ἔτι δύο οὐαὶ μετὰ ταῦτα. 
t Cf. Job 13. Kat ὁ ἕκτος ἄγγελος ἐσάλπισεν ᾿ καὶ ἤκουσα φωνὴν * μίαν ἐκ 

Xvili. 14. if "ἃ diet ees ᾿ Ἧ 
u ge xvi. τῶν κεράτων τοῦ " θυσιαστηρίου τοῦ * χρυσοῦ τοῦ ἐνώπιον τοῦ "ἢ Θεοῦ, 

» XXViii. a a 

22. 14. λέγοντα τῷ ἕκτῳ ἀγγέλῳ ὁ ἔχων τὴν σάλπιγγα, “Λῦσον τοὺς 
Vv ar. dey. a FRAG yt 

N.T. τέσσαρας ἀγγέλους τοὺς δεδεμένους “ἐπὶ TH ποταμῷ τῷ μεγάλῳ 
w Constr. 

Blass,§ “Edppdty”’. 15. Kai ἐλύθησαν ot τέσσαρες ἄγγελοι οἱ ° ἡτοιμα- 

33, Is 

Win. § 29, E 3 Ὁ 

1b. x Cf. xi. 14, rare and irreg. Win. § 28, 2d. y Cf. Ezek. vii. 25-26: irreg. due to Heb. 


fem.=Gk. neut.? Vit. ii. 98 f. z =indef. art. viii. 13, Dan. viii. 13. a Exod. xxx. I-10 
1 Kings ix. 23, Ezek. xli. 22. Ὁ 4.¢., θρόνου (vill. 3). c “At,” or “ beside,” John iv. 6. 
d xvi. 12. e Providential sense, xii. 6, cf. Dan. vii. 12. 


1 After ἀρμάτων om. urmwv (so Sah., Bousset, Baljon, Kénnecke p. 35) as a 
gloss introduced by a copyist to smooth out the sense of the O.T. citation. 


Ξομοιας PQ, min., And., Areth., vg. (edd.) [opotors KA, 14 (Tr., WH marg.)] 
prim. corrupt. of opova as adverb, like ομοιον = οιον i. 13, xiv. τ4 (WH)? 


bably suggested the synonym ᾿Απολλύων, 
containing a (sarcastic?) gibe at Apollo 
with whom the locust was associated 
(*‘uelut proprium nomen Caesaribus,” 
Suet. Oct. 29); cf. Schol. on Aesch. 
Agam. 1085 and Plato’s Cratylus, 404, 
405. Both Caligula and Nero aped the 
deity of Apollo, among their other follies 
of this kind, as Antiéchus Epiphanes had 
already done. 

Ver. 12. A parenthetical remark of the 
author. ἔρχεται with plur. subj. follow- 
ing is not an irregularity due to Greek 
neut. as equiv. to Heb. tem. (Viteau, ii. 
98-100), but an instance of the so-called 
“ Pindaric” anacoluthon (¢f. Moult. i. 58). 

Vv. 13-21. The sixth trumpet blast. 

Ver. 13. The golden altar of incense 
stands before God, as in the original 
tabernacle and temple; the specially 
solemn invocation of the angel shows 
that the Parthian-like invasion consti- 
tutes the climax of this series of disasters. 


φωνήν, as i. 10, x. 4, etc., the “bath 401" 
(Gfrorer, i. 253 f., Dalman, viii. 1). 

Ver. 14. The sixth angel takes part in 
the action. The Euphrates had been the 
ideal Eastern boundary of Israel’s terri- 
tory : it now formed the frontier between 
Rome and her dreaded neighbour, the 
Parthian Empire (Philo, leg. ad C. § ii; 
Verg. Georg. 1. 509 ; Tac. Hist. iv. 51). 

Ver. 15. This quartette of angels (= 
complete ruin, Zech. i. 18 f.) has been 
kept in readiness, or reserved for this 
occasion, though they are not to be con- 
nected (as by Spitta) with the four mo- 
ments of time—hour, day, month, and 
year. Like the use of δεῖ, μέλλει, and 
ἐδόθη, this touch of predestined action 
brings out the strong providential belief 
running through the Apocalypse. On 
the rdle of destructive angels in Jewish . 
eschatology ef. Charles on Slav. En. x. 3 
and for the astrological basis (En. Ixxvi. 
to f.) of this tradition see Fries in Jahrb 


6—17. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨῚΣ LQANNOY 


409 


σμένοι εἰς ‘thy ὥραν καὶ ἡμέραν Kal μῆνα καὶ ἐνιαυτόν, © ἵνα f Constr. i. 


ἀποκτείνωσι τὸ ἢ τρίτον τῶν ἀνθρώπων. 


στρατευμάτων τοῦ | 
ἀριθμὸν αὐτῶν. τη. Καὶ * 


καὶ τοὺς καθημένους ἐπ᾽ αὐτῶν, ἔχοντας θώρακας 
 ῥακινθίνους καὶ ᾿ θειώδεις " καὶ αἱ κεφαλαὶ τῶν ἵππων ὡς κεφαλαὶ 
a A a A 

λεόντων, καὶ ἐκ τῶν στομάτων αὐτῶν ° ἐκπορεύεται πῦρ καὶ καπνὸς 


9, Sib. Or. iii. 544, v. 103. 


ἱππικοῦ δισμυριάδες μυριάδων - ἤκουσα τὸν 
a ‘ 3 a le 
οὕτως εἶδον τοὺς ἵππους ἐν TH ᾿ ὁράσει, 


i Only here in N.T. ; 
Diff. sense in iv. 2. Only in Acts ii. 17 (O.T. quot.), elsewhere in N.T. 
curious variant spineas (= daxav@ivovs) Pr. see Nestle’s Einfuhr. 264. 


Qs V. 12, 
xiv. 6, 
article 
grouping 
several 
substan- 
, . tives. 
πυρίνους καὶ ge With 
ἐλυθ. 
rather 
than 7r. 
despite 
Viii. 6. 
h Zech. xiii. 
ki.e., ‘As is now to be described”. 
m Nah. ii. 3: on the 
n 1 Chron. xii. 8. 


16. καὶ ὁ ἀριθμὸς τῶν 


i 


o (Constr. as in 1 Tim. vi. 4, Jas. iii. 10), cf. xi. 5, Job xli. 19-21, Joel ii. 3. 


f. d. klass, Alterth. (1902) 705 ἢ. Pro- 
bably the author means that the angels 
set in motion the hordes of cavalry (two 
hundred million) described in the semi- 
mythical, semi-historical pageant of the 
next passage. But he does not directly 
connect the two, and it is evident that here 
as at vii. 1 f., we have “" dream-like incon- 
sequences” (Simcox), or else two frag- 
ments of apocalyptic tradition, originally 
heterogeneous, which are pieced together 
(at ver. 16). The four angels here do not 
correspond in function or locality to the 
four unfettered angels of vii. 1; they 
rather represent some variation of that 
archaic tradition in which four angels 
(perhaps angel- princes of the pagan 
hordes) were represented as bound (like 
winds ?) at the Euphrates—a geographi- 
cal touch due to the history of contem- 
porary warfare, in which the Parthians 
played a rdle similar to that of the Huns, 
the Vikings, or the Moors in later ages. 
Since the first century B.c. a Parthian 
invasion of some kind had formed part of 
the apocalyptic apparatus so that there 
is no particular need to allegorise the 
Euphrates into the Tiber or to find the 
four angels in Ps. Ixxviii. 49 (LXX). 
The bloody and disastrous Parthian cam- 
paign of 58-62 (cf. on vi. 2) may account 
for the heightened colour of the scene, 
whether the fragment was composed at 
that period, or (as is most probable) 
written with it in retrospect. But the 
entire vision is one powerful ‘maginative 
development of a tradition preserved in a 
Syriac Apocalypse of Ezra (published by 
Baethgen) which may be based on old 
Jewish materials: ‘and a voice was 
heard, Let those four kings be loosed, 
who are bound at the great river Eu- 
phrates, who are to destroy a third part 
of men. And they were loosed, and 
there was a mighty uproar.” Could this 
be reckoned as proof of an independent 
tradition it would help to illumine the 


application of the idea in John’s Apoca- 
lypse, especially if one could accept with 
Kohler the attractive conjecture of Iselin 
that ἀγγέλους represents a confusion (or 
variety of reading, cf. 2 Sam. xi. 1, I 


Chron. xx. 1) between oon 
(=Gyy.) and 055% in a Hebrew 
original of Apoc. ix. 15 (Zeits. aus der 
Schweis, 1887, 64). The conjecture 
(Spitta, de Faye, J. Weiss) ἀγέλαι 
(=hosts, as in 2 Macc. iii. 18, etc.) is 
less likely, and ἐπὶ cannot be taken with 
λῦσον (Bruston). Cavalry formed a 
standing feature of the final terror for 
the Jewish imagination ever since the 
Parthians loomed on the political horizon 
(Ass. Mos. iii. 1). The whole passage 
was one of those denounced by the Alogi 
as fantastic and ridiculous (cf. Epiph. 
Haer. 11. 34). Gaius also criticised it as 
inconsistent with Matt. xxiv. 7. 

Ver. 16. The second woe is an irrup- 
tion of fiendish cavalry. 

Ver. 17. Here only the writer refers 
to his ‘‘vision”. ἔχοντας (horse and 
rider regarded as one figure: in the Per- 
sian heavy cavalry horses as well as men 
were clad in bright plate) κτλ.» “they 
wore coats of mail, the colour of fire and 
jacinth and brimstone,” 7.6., gleaming 
red, dark blue, and yellow, unless tax. 
(a favourite Oriental military colour) is 
meant to denote the colour of dull smoke. 
Plutarch, in his life of Sulla, describes 
the Medes and Scythians with their 
πυροειδῆ Kal φοβερὰν ὄψιν (cf. Sir. 
x'viii. 9).—tp, «.7.A., like Job’s levia- 
than, Ovid’s bulls (Metam. vii. 104), or 
Diomede’s horses (Lucret. v. 29, cf. Aen. 
vii. 281). They are also as destructive 
as Joel’s locusts. The description is a 
blend of observation and fantastic popu- 
lar beliefs. Brimstone was a traditional 
trait of divine wrath among people who 
“associated the ozonic smell which often 
so perceptibly accompanies lightning 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


IX. 


A ~ ~ , Ν 
18. ἀπὸ τῶν τριῶν πληγῶν τούτων " ἀπεκτάνθησαν τὸ 


19. ἦ γὰρ ἐξουσία τῶν 


~ , 3 
20. Καὶ ot λοιποὶ τῶν ἀνθρώπων ot οὐκ ἀπεκτάνθησαν ἐν 


‘iva “μὴ προσκυνήσουσι τὰ δαιμόνια καὶ τὰ εἴδωλα “Ta 


* καὶ 


410 
4 “ 
Ρ Plur. vb. καὶ θεῖον. 
with sing. , ry ἷς ; - πα . a bby = x ~ a6 me 
noun (in τρίτον τῶν ἀνθρώπων, ἐκ τοῦ “ πυρὸς καὶ TOU καπνοῦ καὶ τοῦ “ὕει 
collective  _ Ὦ τ 
sense); τοῦ ἐκπορευομένου ἐκ τῶν στομάτων αὐτῶν. 
cf. on x a Ps a ἥδ PETES 
viii.g. ἵππων ἐν τῷ στόματι αὐτῶν ἐστιν καὶ ἐν ταῖς οὐραῖς αὐτῶν αἱ γὰρ 
Xiv. 10. - κ᾿ :. κα 
ee 20, οὐραὶ αὐτῶν "ὅμοιαι ὄφεσιν, ἔχουσαι " κεφαλάς, καὶ ἐν αὐταῖς ἀδι- 
xxi. 8 a 
τ Cf. above KOUGL. 
Onver.10.__~ - a o ALA A 
s Sir. xxv. ταῖς πληγαῖς ταύταις, * od! ᾿ μετενόησαν ἐκ τῶν “ ἔργων τῶν " χειρῶν 
15. 2A 
t xvi. 11, 21. HUT@V, 
i “ “ A , A AQ , 
Min’ χρυσᾶ καὶ τὰ ἀργυρᾶ καὶ τὰ χαλκᾶ καὶ τὰ λίθινα καὶ τὰ ” ξύλινα, 
Αἰ Pe Υ ἃ οὔτε βλέπειν δύνανται οὔτε ἀκούειν οὔτε “ περιπατεῖν " 21. 
Ad, 
Isa. ii. 8, 


20:= “idols”. Philo. vit. contempl. § τ. 
result. 
Apoc. Pet. 25, Ezek. xliii. 9. 


w From Dan. v. 4, 23, also from Ps. cxv. 4-7, etc., En. xcix. 7. 


v Constr. iii. 9, Matt. xxi. 32, etc.; ἵνα μὴ of conceived 


x Cf. xxii. 15, 


1 For (before perev.) ovre (AP, 1, 36, etc., Bg., Lach.) read ov C, min., And’, pal, 
Areth., WH, Bs., Bj. [ουδὲ SQ, 14, 38, 92, vg-, Copt., Pesh., Syr., Cyp., Pr., etc., 


Ti., Al. Sw., Ws.]. 


discharges with the presence of sulphur” 
(E. Bi. 611). The symbolism is coloured 
by actual Parthian invasions (cf. vi. 1 f.) 
and by passages like Sap. xi. 18 where 
God punishes men by sending “un- 
known, newly-created wild beasts full of 
rage, breathing out a fiery blast or snort- 
ing out noisome smoke or flashing dread 
sparkles from their eyes.” Mr. Bent 
recalls the curious superstition of the 
modern Therans, who during the erup- 
tions of last century saw ‘‘in the pillars 
of smoke issuing from their volcano, 
giants and horsemen and terrible beasts”’. 

Ver. 19. Heads attached to their ser- 
pentine tails are an allusion not only to 
the well-known tactics of the Parthians 
(cf. Parad. Regained, iii. 323 f.) but to 
a trait of ancient Greek mythology; on 
the altar of Zeus at Pergamos (cf. note 
on ii. 12) the giants who war against the 
gods are equipped with snakes (instead 
of limbs) that brandish open jaws. The 
amphisbaena of ancient mythology was 
often described as possessing a headed 
tail (‘‘tanquam parum esset uno ore fundi 
uenena,” Pliny: H. N. viii. 35). 

Vv. 20, 21. The impenitence of the 
surviving two-thirds of men, who per- 
sist in worshipping daemons and idols 
(Weinel, 3, 4). Hellenic superstition 
(Plut. de defectu orac. 14) attributed to 
malignant daemons these very plagues 
of pestilence, war, and famine. Plutarch 
is always protesting against the exces- 
sive deference paid to such powers, and 
on the other hand against the rationalists 
and Christians who abjured them entirely. 
—fap., either the gods of paganism 


(LXX) or the evil spirits of contemporary 
superstition. In Enoch xix. 1, the spirits 
of the fallen angels “assuming many 
forms defile men and shall lead them 
astray to offer sacrifices to demons as to 
gods”; cf. xlvi. 7 (of the kings and 
rulers) ‘‘ their power rests on their riches, 
and their faith is in the gods which they 
have made with their hands”. (See Clem. 
Strom. vi. 5. 39, 40)---ἀργυρᾶ, contracted 
form, as in 2 Tim. ii. 20 (Helbing, pp. 
34 f.).—gapp., here in special sense of 
magic spells inciting to illicit lust (Arte- 
mid. v. 73), a prevalent Asiatic vice (cf. 
Greg. Naz. Orat. iv. 31). But in the 
imprecatory (c. 100 B.c.) inscription of 
Rheneia (Dittenberger, Syll. Inscript. 
Graec.” pp. 676 f.), punishment is in, oked 
from τὸν κύριον τῶν πνευμάτων (cf. 
Apoc. xxii..6) upon τοὺς δόλωι φονεύσαν- 
τας ἢ φαρμακεύσαντας the hapless girl. 
The three vices of the decalogue occur 
here (as in Matt.) in the Hebrew order, 
not in that of the LXX (Rom. xiii. 9; 
Mark x. 19; Luke xviii. 20). Cf. on xxi. 8, 
and, for the connexion of polytheism and 
vice, Harnack’s Mission and Exp. of 
Christianity, i. (1908), pp. 290 f. Repen- 
tance here (as in xvi. 9. 11) is primarily a 
change of religion, but the prophet has 
evidently little hope of the pagan world. 
There is no polemic against the Egyptian 
worship of animals, and, in spite of the 
Jewish outlook upon the dolores Messiae, 
the Apocalypse ignores family disturb- 
ances and false messiahs as harbingers 
of the end.—Once more (cf. vii. 1 f.) 
between the sixth (ix. 13-21) and the 
seventh (xi. 15-19) members of the series, 


18—21. X. 1—3. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


411 


οὐ μετενόησαν ἐκ τῶν " φόνων αὐτῶν οὔτε ἐκ τῶν " φαρμακειῶν αὐτῶν γ Cf. xvii. 4 


” 2 ~ , 2. ἡ m” > a : 7A 
OUTE εκ TNS πορνείας αὕτων OUTE EK τῶν κλεμμάτων αὐτων. 


with xviii, 


2, 23, En. 
- xeVi4 
X. 1. ΚΑΙ εἶδον ἄλλον ἄγγελον ἰσχυρὸν καταβαίνοντα ἐκ τοῦ alee Lea. 
a xvii. gf., 
οὐρανοῦ, " περιβεβλημένον "νεφέλην, καὶ ἡ "ἶρις ἐπὶ τὴν κεφαλὴν Malin. 3 
ῦ Ἢ a 2 Kings 
αὐτοῦ καὶ τὸ “ πρόσωπον αὐτοῦ ὡς ὁ ἥλιος, Kal οἱ 2 πόδες αὐτοῦ ὡς % γε 
, , \ 67 3 a Ν 3 “1 ΄ > Z an. Aey. 
στύλοι πυρός " 2. Kat ° ἔχων ἐν TH χειρὶ αὐτοῦ * βιβλαρίδιον ἤνεῳγ- ΝΎ 
μένον " καὶ " ἔθηκε τὸν πόδα αὐτοῦ τὸν δεξιὸν ἐπὶ τῆς θαλάσσης, τὸν " hon 
pI Ὁ“ ~ Ἰὰς, acc 
δὲ εὐώνυμον ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, 3. Kal ἔκραξε φωνῇ μεγάλῃ ὥσπερ " λέων cae 
i a νι ῳ ” 9. 7 6) Ἀπ ΞΟ CN yee a “cloud- 
μυκᾶται Kal ὅτε ἔκραξεν, ἐλάλησαν at ἑπτὰ βρονταὶ τὰς ἑαυτῶν weet? 
(like 
) ᾿ Bs ᾿ Horace's 
Augur A pollo). b iv. 3. ci. 16, cf. Matt. xvii. 2. di. 15, cf. Exod. xiv. 19 (LXX), 
e As if ἄλλος ayy. had preceded (ver.1). _  f Corrupt form of class. dimin. βιβλιδάριον. g Sap. 
XViii. 16. h Am. i. 2, iii. 4, 8, Hos. xi. το, etc. idm. Aey. N.T.; of thunder Aesch. Prom. 


1062, Arist. Clouds, 292. 


a passage (this time of some length) is 
intercalated (x. I-xi. 13), in which the 
personality of the seer now re-emerges 
(on earth, instead of in heaven). The 
object of x. I-1z is to mark at once a 
change of literary method and a transi- 
tion from one topic to another. The 
passage, which certainly comes from the 
prophet’s own pen (so Sabatier, Schon, 
and others), looks backward and forward. 
Now that the preliminaries are over, all 
is ready for the introduction of the two 
protagonists (xi.-xiii.) whose conflict 
forms the closing act of the world’s 
history (xv. 1-xx. 10). One of these is 
Jesus, the divine messiah, who has 
hitherto (v.-ix.) been depicted as the 
medium of revelation. Since his réle 
is now to be more active, the prophet 
expressly alters the literary setting of 
his visions. ‘The subsequent oracles are 
not represented as the contents of the 
book of Doom (which is now open, 
with the breaking of its last seal). 
Dropping that figure (contrast v. 2 and 
x. I) the writer describes himself absorb- 
ing another roll of prophecy received 
from an angel. Evidently he intends to 
mark a new departure, and to introduce 
what follows as a fresh start. This new 
procedure is accompanied by an explicit 
assurance—intended to whet the reader’s 
interest—that the Apocalypse has now 
reached the verge of the final catas- 
trophe; the prophet apparently makes 
this eagerness to reach the goal the 
reason for omitting a seven-thunders 
vision (or source) which otherwise he 
might have been expected to include 
either at this point or subsequently. It 
is quite in keeping with the wider out- 
look and rather more historical atmos- 
phere of xi. ἢ, that a freer and less 


numerical method pervades these oracles. 
In short, x. 1-11 is a digression only in 
form. It serves to introduce not simply 
the Jewish fragment (xi. 1-13)—whose 
strange contents probably required some 
express ratification—but the rest of the 
oracles (xiii. f.), which are thus awk- 
wardly but definitely connected with the 
foregoing design (through the closing 
trumpet-vision: x. 7=xi. 15 f.). 

CHAPTER X.—Ver. 1. ἄλλον, referring 
to v. 2, where another strong angel was 
mentioned, also in connexion with a book. 
The position of the seer is implied (since 
viii. 2?) to be no longer in heaven (cf. 
verses 4 and 8), but on earth, as the 
gigantic angel of light descends to him. 
The face and feet are described in stereo- 
typed fashion. In Ezekiel’s description 
of God (i. 28) the appearance of a rain- 
bow surrounds the divine throne, as an 
element of the theophany in nature. 
Here also it is an esthetic detail. Sue- 
tonius describes (Vit. Aug. 95) Augustus 
seeing suddenly ‘“‘in a clear and bright 
sky a circle, like a rainbow in heaven, 
surrounding the sun’s disc’’. 

Ver. 2. ‘‘And in his (left ? cf. ver. 5) 
hand a small booklet open” (in contrast 
to the larger closed book of v. 1), after 
Ezek. 11.9. This colossal figure, like an 
Arabian jin, bestrides earth and sea. His 
message is for the broad world. 

Ver. 3. ὥσπερ λέων (of God in O.T. 
reff.; of the messiah 4 Esd. xi. 37, xii. 
31) μυκᾶται Theokr. Id. xxvi. 21, μύκημα 
λεαίνης, properly of cattle=“‘ to bellow’. 
ἐλάλησαν «.7.A.=‘‘uttered what they 
had to say”’ (7.e., spoke articulately). αἱ 
(the well-known or familiar) βρονταί ‘‘of 
the apocalyptic machinery ”’ (Alford), or 
a popular piece of apocalyptic prophecy 
(see below). Cf. the sevenfold voice of 


412 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


x 


ki. τοῖν, τὸ φωνάς "4 καὶ Ste ἐλάλησαν ai ἑπτὰ βρονταὶ ἤμελλον 1 γράφειν * 


Xiv. 13, 
etc. 
1 Dan. viii. 


26, xii. 4, σαν al ἑπτὰ βρονταί, kat μὴ αὐτὰ γράψῃς. 


cf. Apoc. 
Bar. xx. 


καὶ ἤκουσα " φωνὴν ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, λέγουσαν ᾿ Σφράγισον ἃ ἐλάλη- 


5. Καὶ ὁ ἄγγελος, ὃν 


a c - ΓΕΒ a“ ’ ΕΝ a ol m2? ᾿ - 
εἶδον ἑστῶτα ἐπὶ τῆς θαλάσσης καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, “Ape THY χεῖρα 


3: a \ nA on 
m Gen. xiv. αὐτοῦ Thy δεξιὰν εἰς τὸν οὐρανόν, 6. καὶ " ὥμοσεν ™év TH ζῶντι εἰς 


19, 22, 
Deut. 
XXXli. 40, 


- a Lt ~ A 
τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων, “ ὃς ἔκτισε τὸν οὐρανὸν καὶ TA ἐν αὐτῷ καὶ 


a - ‘ ~ o 
Ezek. xx. THY γῆν καὶ τὰ ἐν αὐτῇ καὶ τὴν θάλασσαν καὶ τὰ ἐν αὐτῇ, “OTL 


ζἐπεθταῖο) P χρόνος οὐκέτι ἔσται 7. ἀλλ᾽ ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις τῆς φωνῆς τοῦ ἑβδό- 


Matt. v. 
34, 36, xxiii. 16, 18, 20-22. 
lv. 3, 10, cf. Ezek. xii. 23-24. 


o Neb. ix. 6, Ps. cxlv. (cxlvi.) 6. 


p =respite, ii. 21, Jos. Bell. 


1The double augment of ἡμελλον (ACQ, min., so Lach., Tr., WH, Ws., Swete) 
is better attested here than in iii. 2, cf. Helbing 71-72. 


the Lord in thunder, Ps. xxix. The 
seven thunders here may be conceived 
loosely as the echoes of the angel’s 
voice reverberating through the universe 
(Spitta, Weiss), thunder, throughout the 
ancient world, being especially venerated 
as a divine voice or warning. 

Ver. 4. To seal or shut up a vision 
is to keep it secret from mankind, i.e., 
in the present case (by a sequence of 
thought which is scarcely logical) to 
leave it unwritten. Ina similar passage 
(Apoc. Bar. xx. 3) ‘“‘seal” means to lay 
up fast in one’s memory (because the 
realisation is not immediate) ; but this 
meaning is suggested by the context, 
although it might suit the present pas- 
sage. The seer describes himself as pro- 
hibited by a heavenly voice (which rever- 
ence leaves as usual undefined, 4 Esd. 
vi. 17: Dalman viii. 1) from obeying 
his impulse. Noreason is assigned; but 
the plain sense of the passage is that 
the author wishes (Weizs., Schon, Bs., 
Holtzm., Pfleid.) to justify his omission 
of a seven-thunder source or set of 
visions circulating in contemporary 
circles of prophecy (x. 7). In view οἱ the 
authoritative character of such fragments 
or traditions John justifies his procedure 
by the explanation that he felt inspired 
to do so, and also to substitute other 
oracles. Thus in the middle, as at the 
opening and end of his book, he reite- 
rates his prophetic authority. The epi- 
sode may further indicate that the written 
contents of the Apocalypse represents 
merely a part of the author’s actual 
vision (cf. John xxi. 25), or it may serve 
to heighten the effect of what is now to 
be introduced, or it may suggest that 
while the seer is to write (i. 11), he is to 
write only what is revealed through the 
medium of angels. In Slav. En. xxiii. 3, 
6 the seer spends thirty days in writing 


the remarks of his angel-instructor. To 
hear ἄρρητα ῥήματα, ἃ οὐκ ἐξὸν ἀνθρώπῳ 
αλῆσαι was not incompatible, however, 
with an ἀποκάλυψις κυρίου (2 Cor. xii. 
1-4), cf. Weinel, 162 f. There was an 
inspiration of restraint as well as an in- 
spiration of impulse. Thus Hermas 
(Vis. i. 3) listens with wonder to glories 
of God which he could not remember, 
‘‘for all the words were awful, such as 
man cannot bear. The last words, how- 
ever, | did remember; they were fit for 
us and mild’. Possibly the seven- 
thunders source was of a severely puni- 
tive character (viii. 5), traversing ground 
which had been already (vi.-ix.) and was 
to be again (xv.-xvi.) covered. 

Vv. 5-6. Modelling from Dan. xii. 7, 
the writer describes the angel’s oath (by 
the living God, as usual in O.T.; cf. 
Matt. xxvi. 63), with its native gesture 
(cf. Trumbull’s Threshold-Covenant, 78 
f.) and contents. In the ancient worid 
oaths were usually taken in the open-air 
(Usener, Gétternamen, 181), before the 
all-seeing deities of the upper light. But 
here, as at iv. 17 and xiv. 7, the eschato- 
logical and the creative acts of God (the 
latter an outcome ot His living might, as 
Sir. xviii. 1, En. v. 1, Acts xiv. 15, etc.) 
are deliberately conjoined; God’s activity 
in creation and providence would culmi- 
nate in judgment. ‘There shall be no 
further delay,” or time lost. The interval 
of vi. 11 (Dan. xii. 7) is over: all is ripe 
now for the end, ἣ συντέλεια καιροῦ. 
The parallels in Slav. En. xxxiii. 2, Ixv. 
7, upon the abolition of seasons and 
periods of time are merely verbal. What 
engages the writer here is the usual point 
of importance in apocalyptic literature, 
viz., “Is it long to the end? Is the 
future longer than the past” (4 Esd. iv. 
44-50) ? 

Ver.’ 7. αν consec. with the Heb, 


4—9. 


μου ἀγγέλου, ὅταν μέλλῃ σαλπίζειν, καὶ “ ἐτελέσθη τὸ μυστήριον 4 xv. x, 
; ΠῚ κι.) ἘΜῈ 8 εῷἹ s ‘ ‘ ε “ A , ”? Joh 
Tod Θεοῦ, "ds "εὐηγγέλισεν τοὺς ἑαυτοῦ δούλους τοὺς προφήτας . 

8. Καὶ ἡ φωνὴ ἣν ἤκουσα ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, πάλιν λαλοῦσαν 
μετ᾽ ἐμοῦ καὶ λέγουσαν, “Ὕπαγε “λάβε τὸ βιβλίον ' τὸ “ ἠνεῳγ- 
μένον ἐν τῇ χειρὶ τοῦ ἀγγέλου τοῦ ἑστῶτος ἐπὶ τῆς θαλάσσης καὶ 


ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς". 


Christianity, Col. i. 26 = Eph. iii. 1-12 = 1 Pet. i. 10-12 = Rom. xvi. 25. 
as act. vb. only here and xiv. 6 (ἐπὶ accus.) in N.T.: late Greek usage. — 
v Double augment, Blass, § 15,7; Win. § 12, 7. 


like avaBa (iv. 2) an Attic form. 
xi. 12, for form. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 


9. Καὶ “ ἀπῆλθα πρὸς τὸν ἄγγελον, λέγων αὐτῷ 


413 


n xix. 


30. 

r Zech. i. 6, 
Amos iii. 
7, Dan. ix. 
6, το, etc., 
cf. Acts 
ili. 21. 
Favourite 
thought 
of sub- 
primitive 

s Cf. Gal. iii. 8. evay. 


t xvi. 1. uv. 7: 
w Cf, ix. 8, 


1For βιβλιϑαριον (Q, etc., Anda,c, Areth.) or βιβλαριδιον (NYP, τ, etc., Al., Ti., 


Bs., Bj.) read βιβλιον AC, 6, 14 (Lach., Tr., WH, Sw., Ws.). 


readings are corrections. 


pf. (LXX= καὶ and fut. indic.) here by an 
awkward solecism (cf. on iii. 20) =“* Then 
is (z.e., shall be) fnished the secret of 
God.” The final consummation (inaug- 
urated by the advent of messiah, xii.) is 
to take place not later than the period of 
the seventh-angel’s trumpet-blast, which 
ex hypothesi is imminent. The μυστή- 
prov is plainly, as the context implies, 
full of solace and relief to God’s people. 
—evnyy- The total (exc. xiv. 6) omission 
of εὐαγγέλιον and the restricted use of 
its verb in the Apocalypse may have been 
due to the fact that such terms had been 
soiled by ignoble usage in the local 
Ionian cult of εὐάγγελος (¢.g., at Ephe- 
sus), with its oracular revelations and 
fellowship of Euangelidae. The Asiatic 
calendar of Smyrna contained a month 
called evayyéAvos.—The connexion be- 
tween pvotyiptov=‘‘secret purpose or 
counsel” (as here) and p.=‘‘ symbol, or 
‘symbolic representation’’ (i. 20, xvii. 7) 
is due to the fact that in the primitive 
world the former was enigmatically con- 
veyed by means of symbolic-representa- 
tions in word, picture, or deed. As ‘‘every 
written word was once a μυστήριον, it 
‘was natural that the word used for the 
sign came to be employed for the thing 
signified (Hatch, Essays in Bibl. Greek, 
61). The near approach of the end had 
been for ;years a matter of confidence 
and joy to the Christian prophets—for it 
is they and not their predecessors who 
are specially in view. The special and 
solemn contribution of John’s Apocalypse 
is to identify certain events in the imme- 
diate future with the throes out of which 
the final bliss was to be born. These 
throes include the downfall of the dragon 
from heaven, the subsequent climax of 
the Beast’s influence on earth, and the 
assertion of God’s authority over his 


The two former 


own and against his foe’s adherents 
(xii.-xiv. 20). The great and glad revela- 
tion is God seen in action, with his 
forces deployed for the final campaign 
which, with its issues of deliverance and 
triumph (xv.-xxii.), forms the climax of 
this book. The apotheosis of the Czesars 
in their life-time—above all, of Domitian 
—marked the pitch of human depravity ; 
divine intervention was inevitable. 

Up to the end of ch. ix., the Apoca- 
lypse is fairly regular and intelligible ; 
thereafter, criticism enters upon an intri- 
cate country, of which hardly any survey 
has yet succeeded in rendering a satis- 
factory account. The problem begins 
with ch. x. Although vv. 1-7 complete 
the preceding oracles by introducing 
their finale (7=xi. 14 f.), while 8-11 con- 
nect more immediately with ch. xi., this 
forms no reason for suspecting that the 
oracle is composite. Spitta takes ra, 2b- 
7 (except 4) as the continuation of ix., 
followed by xi. 15, 19, while the rest is 
substantially a prelude to xi. 1-13; Briggs 
similarly views 1a, 3-7 as the original 
transition between ix. and xi. 14, 15 a, 
19, while x. 1 b-2, 8-11 (a vision of mes- 
siah) introduces the new source of xi. 
I-13, xii. 18; and Rauch regards x. x b, 
2 ἃ, 5-7, 4, 0.11 as the opening of xi. 
I-13, xii. I-17, with x. 1-4 a (substan- 
tially) as the preface to xii. 18-xiii., xvi. 
13-16. These analyses are unconvincing. 
The alleged signs of a Hebrew original 
(e.g., ver. 7, also λέγουσί μοι and λέγει 
pou in vv. 9, 11 = variant versions of 


ak DN) are not decisive. 


Ver. 8. ἡ φωνὴ (cf. ver. 4) left un- 
grammatically without a predicate, the 
two participles being irregularly attracted 
into the case of ἥν (cf. i. 1, iv. 11). 

Vv. g-10. The prophet absorbs the 


414 


x For basis 
of this 
passage, 
cf. Ezek. , 
ii. 8—iii. 3, € 


σται γλυκὺ ὡς peru”. 
Psiicxix: 


103,and χειρὸς τοῦ ἀγγέλου, καὶ κατέφαγον αὐτό" 


4 Esd. 
viii. 4 
(absorbet 
ergo 
anima 
sensum 
et deuoret 
quod 
sapit). 
Moulton, i. 111, 115). ; 
John xii. 16: = “" οἵ," “concerning”. 


μου. 


word of God; in our phrase, he makes it 
his own or identifies himself with it (Jer. 
xv. 16). To assimilate this revelation of 
the divine purpose seems to promise a 
delightful experience, but the bliss and 
security of the saints, he soon realises, 
involve severe trials (cf. xi. 2, xii. 13 f., 
etc.) for them as well as catastrophes for 
the world. Hence the feeling of disrelish 
with which he views his new vocation as 
a seer. The distasteful experience is 
put first, in ver. 9, as being the un- 
expected element in the situation. (The 
omission of bitterness in LXX of Ezek. 
iii. 14 renders it unlikely that this addi- 
tional trait of unpleasant taste is due, as 
Spitta thinks, to an erroneous combina- 
tion of Ezek. iii. 2 and14). The natural 
order occurs in ver. 10. The only an- 
alogous passage in early Christian litera- 
ture is in the ‘‘ Martyrdom of Perpetua” 
(iv. cf. Weinel, 196,197). Wetstein cites 
from Theophrastus the description of an 
Indian shrub οὗ 6 καρπὸς . . . ἐσθιόμε- 
vos γλυκὺς. οὗτος ἐν τῇ κοιλίᾳ δηγμὸν 
ποιεῖ καὶ δυσεντερίαν. Before the happy 
consummation (ver. 7), a bitter prelude 
is to come, which is the subject of 
national and political prophecies. In 
order to underline his divine commission 
for this task of punitive prediction, he 
recalls his inspiration. 

Ver. 11. λέγ. μοι, an oblique, rever- 
ential way of describing the divine im- 
pulse, due to Aramaic idiom and common 
in later Biblical Hebrew (cf. Dalman, i., 
viii. 11). The series of oracles, thus 
elaborately inaugurated, is concerned in- 
creasingly (‘‘ again,” in view of iv. 4, 15, 
Vii. 4, 9, Viii. 13, ix. 6, 16 f.) with those 
international movements (‘‘kings” = 
φυλαί, or those in xvii. τὸ, 12) which 
a prophet related to the course of the 
divine kingdom. Strictly speaking, the 
revelation assimilated in x. 10, II opens 
in xii., but the intervening passage is 
linked to both (see below). The first 
part of this passage (xi. I-2, 3-13) evi- 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ITQANNOY 


“ἐ δοῦναί μοι τὸ βιβλαρίδιον ” 
μ' Pp 


11. Kat *Aéyouciv μοι, “Δεῖ σε πάλιν προφητεῦσαι 


See Dieterich’s Mithras-Liturgie, p. 101. 
z =“I was told” (like xi. 1, xvi. 15 impers. plur.). 
b Pleonastic, as v. 9, vii. 9, Dan. iii. 4, vii. 14, cf. xiii. 7. 


xe 


. Kat λέγει μοι, " “Λάβε καὶ κατά- 


gaye αὐτό᾽ καὶ πικρανεῖ σου τὴν κοιλίαν, ἀλλ᾽ ἐν τῷ στόματί σου 
1ο. Καὶ ἔλαβον τὸ βιβλαρίδιον ἐκ τῆς. 


Ae 3 - ’ , 
και Ἴν εν τῷ στόματι 


μου ὡς μέλι, γλυκύ" καὶ ὅτε " ἔφαγον αὐτό, ἐπικράνθη ἡ κοιλία 


‘ 
* ἐπι 


Ῥλαοῖς καὶ ἔθνεσι καὶ γλώσσαις καὶ "ἢ βασιλεῦσι toddots”’. 


y In sense of κατέφαγον which it echoes (cf. 
i a Cf. xxii. 16, 


dently forms part of the βιβλαρίδιον 
(cf. Introd. § 2). Its enigmatic contents. 
interrupting the trumpet-visions , with 
edges which do not fit into the context 
or the rest of the Apocalypse, point to 
the incorporation of a special and dis- 
parate source. Any analysis is more or 
less hypothetical, but the writer is evi- 
dently not moving with absolute free- 
dom. He has his own end in view, but 
he reaches it, here as elsewhere (cf. vii. 
1 f.) by means of stepping-stones which 
originally lay in different surroundings. 
This is widely recognised by critics and 
editors, who commonly take 1-2 and 3- 
13 as separate oracles. Each indeed 
might be the torso o a larger source. 
But, in spite of the different descriptions 
of Jerusalem, the hypothesis of their 
original unity has much in its favour. 
How could so tiny a scrap of papyrus as 
that required for 1,2 be preserved? Be- 
sides ver. 3 goes with ver. 2 (the pro- 
phetic mission as a counterpart to the 
punishment), the two periods are alike, 
the strange 8(8wpt-construction occurs 
in both (here only in Apoc.), and the in- 
version of object and verb is common to 
both (2, 5, 6, 9, 10). To discover an 
oracle of the Zealots in 1, 2 (Wellhausen, 
Bousset, Baljon, J. Weiss) is precarious, 
for even if we could suppose that these 
passionate citizens took time to write 
oracles, they had not a monopoly of be- 
lief in the temple’s inviolability. The 
latter belief conflicts with Mark xiii. 1, 2: 
(Ac. vi. 14); but, while this makes it 
extremely unlikely that the passage was. 
adopted, or at least composed, by one of 
the Twelve, it does not necessarily dis- 
prove a Jewish Christian origin for the 
fly-leaf. Patriotism must have often 
swayed hope, even in face of authorita- 
tive logia. Still, a Jewish origin is more 
probable (so from Vischer and Sabatier 
to Baljon, Forbes, von Soden, Wellhausen 
and J. Weiss), in which case 8 ¢ (ὅπον. 
. « - ἐσταυρώθη), with possibly 9 a and 


10---11. XI. 1. 


ΧΙ. 1. Kai " ἐδόθη "μοι " κάλαμος ὅμοιος 


12 b, must be Christianising touches by 
the editor. As 8 ¢ is the only place in 
the Apocalypse where Jesus is thus de- 
signated (contrast 4), and as the un- 
exampled at... ἑστῶτες occurs in 4, 
the editor may be using a previous 
translation of the fly-leaf. Otherwise, 
the repeated traces of Hebraistic idiom 
suggest that he translated it from an 
Aramaic or Hebrew original (so especi- 
ally Weyland, Briggs, and Bruston) 
which was a Jewish (or Jewish Christian) 
oracle, composed towards the end of the 
siege in 70 A.D. between May and 
August (cf. Joseph. Bell, v. 12,3) by a 
prophet who anticipated (cf. S.C., 2109, 
220) that the temple and a nucleus of the 
God-fearing would be kept inviolate dur- 
ing the last times of the Gentiles, at the 
end of which anti-Christ or the pseudo- 
messiah would blasphemously re-assert 
himself in the temple (hence its preserva- 
tion, 1, 2), according to one cycle of 
tradition (2 Thess. ii. 3, etc., cf. A. C. 
160 f.), after murdering the two heralds 
of messiah. The motives and further 
career of the beast are omitted, if not in 
the source, at least by the editor. He 
resumes the subject afterwards (cf. xiii. 
6), when the eschatological monster is 
specially identified with the imperial 
power. Here his main concern is with 
the fate of the two witnesses. Probably 
it was this feature of the oracle which 
primarily led him to adopt and adapt 
it, as showing how the beast or anti- 
christ was foiled in his attack on mes- 
siah’s forerunners, just as (in xii.) the 
dragon is foiled in his attack on messiah 
himself. The other details are left 
standing; in their present setting they 
have much the same pictorial and 
dramatic interest as the minutiz of the 
parables, and it is perhaps doubtful 
whether the editor lnked any sym- 
bolic or allegorical meaning to them, 
although such can easily be attached in 
a variety of ways, ¢.g., to the language 
of 1, 2in the light of Barn. iv. 11, Ign. 
ad Magn. 7, etc. (so Weiss, Simcox, 
Swete, and others). Even the two wit- 
nesses are not to be identified with any 
historical figures of contemporary life, 
much less taken as allegorical or as 
typifying aspects of the church’s testi- 
mony. ‘The vision... is of the 
nature of a superimposed photograph 
showing traces of many pasts” (Abbott). 
The original Jewish tradition which lay 
behind the source expected only Elijah, 


ΑἸΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


ALS 
» ῥάβδῳ, λέγων, ax. τι. 


ΧΧΙ, 15-16, 

iY Ezek. xl. 

3-6, xlii. 16-19, Zech. ii, 1. 
who should preach repentance to the 
pagan world, but he was occasionally 
furnished with a companion in Moses 
(on the basis of Deut. xviii. 15; cf. Mal. 
iv. 4, 5, the transfiguration-story, and 
possibly the two radiant saints of Apoc. 
Pet. 6f.). The only other serious rival 
is Enoch, a grand figure in Jewish and 
early Christian eschatological tradition 
(for the curious Sir, xliv. 16, cf. E. Bi. 
1295). Later tradition, indeed, thinking 
mainly of Elijah and Enoch (Gfrérer ii. 
261 f.; A. C. 203, 211), whom antichrist 
in wrath slays for their witness against 
him, and whom God (or Michael and 
Gabriel) resuscitates, suggests a fairly 
apposite cycle of belief which may re- 
produce the earlier Jewish expectation 
out of which the materials of this frag- 
mentary oracle have been drawn. The 
unique character of this expectation is 
illustrated, not so much by Anu and 
Nudimmut, Marduk’s predecessors in 
the fight against Tiamat, as by the 
Zoroastrian belief that the temporary 
triumph of the evil spirit would be fol- 
lowed by the appearance of two reformers 
or prophets, Hushédar and Hushédarmah 
(5. B. E. xxiii. 195; cf. Hiibschmann, 
227), who would act each for a mil- 
lenium on earth as the precursors and 
heralds of their Lord, the Persian mes- 
siah. This belief is much older than the 
sources in which it occurs, and like 
several other Zoroastrian traits, it may 
have fused with the Jewish expecta- 
tion in question, though the Zoroastrian 
heralds do not appear simultaneously (cf. 
Encycl. Relig. and Ethics,i. 207). Here 
at any rate the appearance of the two 
anonymous and mysterious witnesses 
precedes the final outburst of evil (xi. 7, 
xii. f.) and the manifestation of messiah 
(xi. 15 f., xiv. 14f.)—an idea for which no 
exact basis can be found in the strictly 
Jewish eschatology of the period. It 
may have grown up under the influence 
of this kindred trait in the adjoining pro- 
vince of Zoroastrian belief, unless the 
doubling of the witnesses was simply 
due to the side-influence of the Ze- 
chariah-trait (in ver. 4). Wellhausen 
argues from the singular πτῶμα (8, 9) 
that the two witnesses were a duplication 
of the original single witness, i.e., Elijah: 
but the singular is collective, and there 
is no trace of any conflation with Jonah, 
CHAPTER XI.—Vv. 1, 2. ‘‘And I wa 


given a rod (TWAT 773}?) like a staff, 


416 


AITOKAAY¥IZ IQANNOY 


XI. 


- * A A 
c Ezek, xli. Ἔγειρε καὶ “ μέτρησον τὸν “ ναὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ, καὶ τὸ θυσιαστήριον, καὶ 


1-2. 


ἀ John viii. τοὺς προσκυνοῦντας “ἐν αὐτῷ" 2. καὶ τὴν αὐλὴν τὴν ἔξωθεν τοῦ 
0, 


20. 
e See on 
Xvii. 17, 


ναοῦ ἔκβαλε ἔξωθεν, kat μὴ αὐτὴν μετρήσῃς, ὅτι " ἐδόθη τοῖς ἔθνεσι" 


fn WOT RE SS aN ‘ F fet ee £ , - , , 
prophetic Και THY πολιν ΤῊΡ αγιαν πατήησουσι μηνας τεσσεράκοντα δύο. 


perfect. 


fxxi.a,xxii.3- Kat "δώσω τοῖς ϑυσὶ μάρτυσί ‘pou, "Kal " προφητεύσουσιν 


19, Matt. 
XXVIi. 53 
(title of 
Jer. in 
later , a ἘΔ» ες εὐ 
Judaism). Κυρίου τῆς γῆς ” ἑστῶτες. 
g Ps. Sol. 
Vii. 2, 


XVii. 25, Luke xxi. 24; see wail of 4 Esd. vi. 56f. 


xiv. 3, 24. 1 ver.»2, xil. 6. 
ο Cf. Win. § 23, 50. 


m Isa. xxii. 12, Jer. vi. 26, Jas. iii. 5 
p Grammat. irregularity, to emphasise personality of witnesses. 


, ’ 
ἡμέρας χιλίας διακοσίας ' ἑξήκοντα, περιβεβλημένοι  “ σάκκους. 
4. " Οὗτοί εἰσιν αἱ δύο ἐλαῖαι καὶ at δύο λυχνίαι αἱ ἐνώπιον τοῦ 


h Cf. on ix. 5. 1: π᾿ ΚΑΞι Cor. 


n From Zech. iv. 3, 11-14. 


For περιβεβλημένοι (CC, 1, S., vg., And., Areth., Vict., Hipp., etc., so Al., 
Ti., Ws., Bs., Bj., Sw.) Lach., Tr., WH read the primitive corruption περιβεβλη- 
μένους (Q*AQP, min.), though WH suggest it may be an early error for weptBeBAn- 


μενοις. 


with the words” (λέγων by a harsh at- 
traction, cf. LXX of 1 Kings xx. 9, Josh. 
ii. 2, is left in apposition to the subject 
implied in ἐδόθη), “‘ Up (or come= 97) 
and measure the temple of God and the 
altar (of burnt-offering, which stood out- 
side the inner shrine) and (sc. number) 
those who worship there "ἢ (.6., in the 
inner courts, xiii. 6; for constr. cf. 2Sam. 
viii. 3). The outer court (Ezek. x. 5) is 
to be left out of account (é«B.=“‘omit”’ or 
exclude as unworthy of attention), “for 
it has been abandoned (or, assigned in 
the divine counsel) to the heathen, and 
(indeed) they shall trample on the holy 
city itself (emphatic by position, = Jeru- 
salem) for two and forty months.” In 
Asc. Isa. iv. 12 antichrist’s sway lasts 
for three years, seven months, and 
twenty-seven days, but three and a half 
years is the conventional period for the 
godless persecutor to get the upper hand 
(cf. iii. 5, after Daniel’s “time, and 
times, and the dividing of time,” i.e., 
three and a half years, vii. 25, xii. 7). 
Originally this broken seven as the 
period of oppression reflected the Baby- 
lonian three and a half winter months 
(5. C. 309 f.; Cheyne’s Bible Problems, 
111 f.), preceding the festival of Marduk 
in the vernal equinox, a solstice during 
which Tiamat reigned supreme. Here 
it is the stereotyped period of the καιροὶ 
τῶν ἐθνῶν (Luke xxi. 24), extending to 
the second advent.—perpyjons. To mea- 
sure is here not a prelude to ruin but a 
guarantee of preservation and restoration 
(Zech. ii. 1 f.). Failure to satisfy God's 
standard or test means calamity for men, 
but when he surveys their capacities 


and needs in peril, it implies protection. 
As the context implies, this is the idea of 
the present measuring. It is not to be 
identified prosaically with ‘‘ orders given 
to the Roman soldiers, who were en- 
camped in Jerusalem after its destruc- 
tion, not to set foot in what had been 
the Holy of Holies”” (Mommsen). 


Ver. 3. σάκκους, the simple, archaic 
garb of prophets, especially appropriate 
to humiliation (reff.). The faithful pro- 
phets who withdraw from the local apos- 
tacy to the desert in company with Isaiah 
(Asc. Isa. ii. g f.) are also clothed in this 
black hair-cloth. The voice of the divine 
speaker here “melts imperceptibly into 
the narrative of the vision” (Alford, cf. 
ver. 12). Contemporary Jewish belief 
(4 Esd. vi. 26) made these ‘‘ witnesses” 
(men “who have not tasted death from 
their birth,” z.e., Enoch, Elijah) appear 
before the final judgment and preach 
successfully, but the only trace of any 
analogous feature in rabbinical prophecy 
seems to be the appearance of Moses 
and Messiah during the course of the 
Gog and Magog campaign. The repro- 
duction of this oracle, long after its ori- 
ginal period in 70 a.p., would be facili- 
tated by the fact that the visions of 
Ezekiel and Zechariah, upon which it 
was modelled, both presupposed the fall 
of the city and temple in ancient Jeru- 
salem (Abbott, pp. 84-88). 


Ver. 4. They are further described in 
the terms applied by Zechariah to the 
two most prominent religious figures of 
his day, except that they are compared 
to two lampstands, not to one which is 
septiform. The idea is that their autho- 


2—8. 


5. καὶ εἴ τις αὐτοὺς θέλει ἀδικῆσαι, 


A A ~ ΠῚ , 
“ πῦρ ἐκπορεύεται ἐκ τοῦ στόματος αὐτῶν καὶ κατεσθίει 


τοὺς ἐχθροὺς αὐτῶν" 


καὶ εἴ 1 τις αὐτοὺς " θελήσῃ ἀδικῆσαι, 


οὕτω δεῖ αὐτὸν ἀποκτανθῆναι. 


6. οὗτοι ἔχουσιν τὴν ἐξουσίαν " κλεῖσαι τὸν " οὐρανόν, 
ἵνα μὴ ὑετὸς βρέχῃ τὰς ἡμέρας αὐτῶν τῆς προφητείας 


αὐτῶν, 


καὶ ἐξουσίαν * ἔχουσιν ἐπὶ τῶν * ὑδάτων, 


στρέφειν αὐτὰ εἰς αἷμα, 


καὶ "πατάξαι τὴν γῆν ἐν πάσῃ πληγῇ; 


ὁσάκις ἐὰν θελήσωσιν. 


7. Καὶ ὅταν τελέσωσι τὴν μαρτυρίαν αὐτῶν, τὸ θηρίον τὸ ἀναβαῖ- 


νον ἐκ τῆς “ ἀβύσσου " ποιήσει μετ᾽ 
αὐτοὺς καὶ ἀποκτενεῖ αὐτούς. 


a vee 
(Apoc. xiii. 7)? 


ATIOKAAY¥VIZ ILQANNOY 


Ν ‘ ~ ΕΜ πον A 
8. καὶ τὸ πτῶμα αὐτῶν ἐπὶ τῆς 


u Cf. Encycl. Relig. and Ethics, i. 53:55. 


417 


ΠΧ 57,2 
Kings i. 
10f., 
Luke ix. 
54) 
(Moses) 
Num. xvi 
35+ . 

t For subj. 
with ei, 
cf. 1 Cor 
Xiv. 5 
(Deissm. 
118). 

s 1 Kings 
Xvii., Sir. 
xviii. 3, 
Jub. 
Xxlii. 18. 

t See feats 
ascribed 
to Moses 
in Exod. 
Vii. 19-21; 
1 Sam. iv 
a σὰ , ‘ , 

QUTWY πόλεμον και νικήσει 


v From Dan. vii. 21; divine permission 


‘For και et Bl. conj. καν (from katy $*C, 1). 


rity and influence are derived from God. 
As in ver. 7, the function of the two 
witnesses (cf. Deut. xvii. 6, xix. 15) is 
defined as ‘‘prophecy,” but no details 
are given. 

Vv. 5, 6. In this description, borrowed 
from traditional features of Moses and 
Elijah (whose drought lasted for three 
and a half years, according to Luke iv. 
25; James v. 17), the metaphorical ex- 

pressions of passages like Jer. v. 14 and 
’ Sir. xlviii. 1 are translated into grim 
reality (see reff.), as in Slav. En. i. 5 and 
the thaumaturgic practices chronicled by 
Athen. iv. 129 D and Lucian (Philopseud. 
12). These are no meek apostles of the 
Christian faith. To stop rain was equi- 
valent to a punishment for iniquity (Ps. 
Sol. xvii. 20-22, En. c. 11, etc.) 

Ver. 7. The influence of Hebraic 
idiom helps to explain (cf. xx. 7-9) the 
translator’s ‘‘transition from futures 
through presents to preterites” here 
(Simcox). τελέσωσι (Burton, 203) in- 
dicates no uncertainty. When their 
work is done, they are massacred—not 
till then; like their Lord (Luke xiii. 31 
f.), they are insured by loyalty to their 
task. The best comment upon this and 
the following verses, a description col- 
oured by the famous passage in Sap. ii. 
I2-iii, 9, is Bunyan’s description of the 
jury in Vanity Fair and their verdict. 
This beast ‘‘from the abyss’’ is intro- 


duced as a familiar figure—an editorial 
and proleptic reference to the beast 
‘‘from the abyss’’ in xvii. 8 or from 
“the sea” (xiii. 1; the abyss and the sea 
in Rom. x, 7 = Deut. xxx. 13) which 
was (cf. Encycl. Rel. and Ethics, i. 53 f.) 
the haunt and home of daemons (Luke 
Vili. 31, etc.), unless he is identified with 
the supernatural fiend and foe of ix. 2, rr. 
(Bruston heroically gets over the diffi- 
culty of the beast’s sudden introduction 
by transferring xi. I-13 to a place after 
xix. I-3). The beast wars with the wit- 
nesses (here, as in ix. 9 and xii. 17, 
Field, on Luke xiv. 31, prefers to take 
πόλεμον = pax Hv,a Single combat or battle, 
as occasionally in LXX [e.g., 3 Kings 
xxxii. 34] and Lucian), and vanquishes 
them, yet it is the city (ver. 13) and not 
he who is punished. The fragmentary 
character of the source is evident from 
the fact that we are not told why or how 
this conflict took place. John presup- 
posed in his readers an acquaintance 
with the cycle of antichrist traditions 
according to which the witnesses of God 
were murdered by the false messiah who, 
as the abomination of desolation or man 
of sin, was at feud with all who opposed 
his worship or disputed his authority. 
Ver. 8. God’s servants rejected and 
cast aside, as somuchrefuse! See Sam. 
Agonistes, 667-704. The “great city”’ 
is Jerusalem, an identification favoured 


418 


w xiv.8,xvi- πλατείας τῆς “ πόλεως τῆς 
19, XxVii.- 
XVili. 

x Ps. cv. 38. 


AILOKAAY VIZ [QANNOY 


ΧΙ. 


ἡ μεγάλης, ἥτις καλεῖται πνευματικῶς 
Σόδομα καὶ “Αἴγυπτος, ὅπου καὶ 6 Κύριος αὐτῶν ἐσταυρώθη. 9. 


y Cf.onii. καὶ βλέπουσιν ἢ ἐκ τῶν λαῶν καὶ φυλῶν καὶ γλωσσῶν καὶ ἐθνῶν τὸ 


10 (parti- ἃ 
tive). 

a Here asin 
8= collec- 


tive term (“corpses”), as πρόσωπον Gen. xlviii. 20, κεφαλή Lev. x. 6. 


πτῶμα αὐτῶν ἡμέρας τρεῖς καὶ ἥμισυ, kal τὰ " πτώματα αὐτῶν οὐκ 


b Cf. Isa. Ixxviii. (1xxix.) 


3, Ps. Sol. ii. 31, En.xxii. 10; 2 Kings ix. 10, and Jer. xxiii. 19. 


1 Pr. om. kat Avyvmros (an early gloss, Haussleiter 213). 


Further editorial 


Christian additions are suspected in nts ... ἐσταυρωθη (so ¢.g., Weyland, S. 
Davidson, Wellh.) or owov . . . εσταυρωθη (so ¢.g., Sabatier, Schdn, Vischer, 
Pfleid., Rauch, Volter, Baljon, Bs., de Faye, Kohler, von Soden). 


by (a) incidental O.T. comparisons of 
the Jews to Sodom (Isa. !i. 9; Jer. xxiii. 
14; so Asc. Isa. iii. 10), (b) the Christian 
editor’s note ὅπου καὶ ὁ κύριος αὐτῶν 
ἐσταυρώθη, (c) a passage like Luke xiii. 
33, (4) the reference in xvi. 19, and (e) pas- 
sages in Appian (Syr. 50 μεγίστη πόλις 
‘I.), Pliny (ΗΠ. N. xiv. 70), Josephus 
(Apion, i. 22), and Sib. Or. (v. 154, 226, 
413, written before 80 4.p.), all of which 
confirm this title (cf. the variant addition 
μεγάλην in Apoc. xxi. 10) : it isindeed put 
beyond doubt by the peculiar antichrist- 
tradition upon which the Jewish original 
was based (A.C. 19f., 134f., E. Bi.i. 179, 
180). The obscurity and isolated char- 
acter of this eschatology, ‘‘an exotic 
growth upon the soil of Judaism ”’ and 
much more in early Christianity, may be 
accounted for perhaps by the historical 
changes in the later situation, which 
concentrated the antichrist in anti-Roman 
rather than in anti-Jewish hostility. As 
yet, however, the seduction of the Jews 
ty a false messiah (cf. John v. 43 and 
its patristic interpretation) was quite a 
reasonable expectation : see the evidence 
gathered in A. C. 166 f. Victorinus, fol- 
lowing the Apocalypse literally (xi. 7 = 
xvii. 11), makes Nero redivivus beguile 
the Jews. The alternative to this theory 
has won considerable support (especially 
from Spitta and Wellhausen) upon various 
grounds; it regards the great city as 
Rome, where the two prophets are sup- 
posed to preach repentance to the hea- 
then world and eventually to be killed. 
But although this suits some portions of 
the language well (e.g., ver. 13, con- 
version to God of heaven), it is not 
exegetically necessary; it introduces 
Rome abruptly (8 ¢ being of course taken 
as a gloss) and irregularly: nor does it 
explain the general contour of the oracle 
as happily as that advocated above. 
Bruston’s ingenious attempt to take τ. 
μεγάλης with πλατείας (= Jewish jus- 


tice) is quite untenable, and the great 
city is not likely to be a translator’s 


error (Weyland), ΡΥ Τὰ for PTW: 
--πνευματικῶς (cf. Gal. iv. 24 1.) as dp- 
posed to σαρκικῶς (‘‘literally,” Just. 
Mart. Dial. xiv. 231 d) is “allegorically, 
or mystically.’”’—xat Αἴγυπτος, not as the 
home of magic (cf. Blau’s Alijiid. Zauber- 
wesen, 39 f.) but as a classical foe of 
God’s people (and Moses of old?). The 
connexion with the water-dragon of xii. 
15 (cf. Ezek. xxix. 3, xxxii. 2) is obvious. 
Philo allegorises E. usually as a type of 
the corporeal and material.——87rov «.7.., 
no wonder if Christians suffer, after what 
their Lord had to suffer (cf. Matt. x. 22- 
25, 28 f.) at the hands of impious men. 
There is none of the modern’s surprise or 
indignation at the thought of “ Christian 
blood shed where Christ bled for men”. 


Ver. 9. Cf. 2 Chron. xxiv. 19 f., Matt. 
xxiii. 34 f., Job. i. 1τ2.---ἀφίουσιν, for 
other N.T. assimilations of irreg. to reg. 
verb (Win. § 14. 16; Blass, § 23. 7), of. 
Mark i. 34, Luke xi. 4. In Ep. Lugd. 
the climax of pagan malice is the refusal 
to let the bodies of the martyrs be buried 
by their friends, ὑπὸ yap ἀγρίου Onpds 
ἄγρια καὶ βάρβαρα φῦλα παραχθέντα 
δυσπαύστως εἶχες The rendering ot 
burial honours to the dead was a matter 
of great moment in the ancient world; 
to be denied pious burial meant ignominy 
in the memory of this world and penalties 
in the next. The two witnesses are 
treated as the murdered high priests, 
Ananus and Jesus, were handled by the 
Jewish mob in the seventh decade (Jos. 
Bell. iv. 5, 2).--- βλέπουσιν, the onlookers, 
who evidently sympathise with anti- 
christ (cf. on xvi. 12), include pagans as 
well as Jews (Andr.).— ἡμέρας, x.7.A., 
three and a half as the broken seven (cf. 
on ver. 2) here in days. This trait 
(cf. on ver. 12) shows that their fate was 
not originally modelled on that of Jesus. 


g—15. 


ἀφίουσιν " τεθῆναι εἰς μνῆμα. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ΙΩΏΑΝΝΟΥ 


IO. καὶ οἱ κατοικοῦντες ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ς 


419 


Ps. cv. 38) 
Neh. viii. 


, a“ - 
χαίρουσιν ἐπ᾽ αὐτοῖς καὶ εὐφραίνονται᾿ καὶ “δῶρα πέμψουσιν 1 το, 12, 


Esth. ix. 


ἀλλήλοις, ὅτι οὗτοι οἱ δύο προφῆται “ ἐβασάνισαν τοὺς κατοικοῦντας το, 22. 


ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς. 


Ν A 

καὶ © φόβος μέγας *émémecev ἐπὶ τοὺς ἢ θεωροῦντας αὐτούς. 
Ἅ....ὄ ὃν. 3 i ~ ar > a > A λ , 3 - 

καὶ ἤκουσανῇ ᾿ φωνῆς μεγάλης ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ λεγούσης αὐτοῖς, jo. 
ΟΥ̓͂Ν Σ΄ > BY > Ἀ > ~m , 

Kat ᾿ ἀνέβησαν εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν ἐν τῇ ™vededy> 


“ΚΥΑνάβατε ὧδε᾽᾽᾿. 


ν . a 
καὶ ἐθεώρησαν αὐτοὺς ot ᾿ἐχθροὶ αὐτῶν. 


ΓῚ ‘ A A ε έ eee Ζ - A 
II. “Καὶ μετὰ τρεῖς ἡμέρας καὶ ἥμισυ * πνεῦμα ζωῆς 
ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ εἰσῆλθεν ἐν αὐτοῖς,2 καὶ ἔστησαν ἐπὶ τοὺς πόδας αὐτῶν, 


d Sap. ii.1a 
14-15, I 
ings 
Xviil. 17. 

e From 
Ezek. 
XXXVii. 5, 


12. 


f xiii. 15,= 
pon 
mM 


13. Kat ἐν ἐκείνῃ τῇ ὥρᾳ 


ἐγένετο " σεισμὸς μέγας, καὶ τὸ “ δέκατον τῆς πόλεως ἔπεσε, καὶ (Gen. vi. 


17). 


ἀπεκτάνθησαν ἐν τῷ σεισμῷ "ὀνόματα ἀνθρώπων χιλιάδες ἑπτά ”g Gen. xv. 


καὶ ot λοιποὶ ἔμφοβοι ἐγένοντο καὶ 
οὐρανοῦ. 
14. " Ἧ οὐαὶ ἡ δευτέρα ἀπῆλθεν" 


ἰδοὺ ἡ οὐαὶ ἡ τρίτη ἔρχεται ταχύ. 
15. Καὶ ὁ ἕβδομος ἄγγελος ἐσάλπισεν, καὶ ἐγένοντο φωναὶ μεγά- 


λαι ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ, "λέγοντες, 


in vi. 16, xvii. 6, and xviii. 10. 
Ὁ am. Aey. N.T. t 
Jer. xiii. 16, Dan. ii. 18, 44, Isa. xxv. 3. 


whole favour the futures in 9-10. 


1 2 Kings ii. 11. 
p Cf. on iii. 4, Num. i. 20, 28; Deissm. 196-197, Abbott 91-93. 
r Cf. as ix. 12, and xii. 12. 


(citation from Dan. ii. 19), in N.T.:=S OW? ΓΝ. 
1Ti., Bs., Bj. read πεμπουσὶιν (pQ*P, Arm., Tic., Spec., etc.). 


mi ~ a A 12. 
“ἔδωκαν δόξαν “τῷ Θεῷ τοῦ h Only here 


in Apoc. 
i Par. Lost, 
vi. 29-36. 
k Win. § 13, 
22. Such 
unusual 
-a forms 
of sec. 
aor. are 
textually 
untenable 
however 
Nn vi. 12, Matt. xxvii. 51. 
4 Xvi. 9, II, 
s Only here and xvi. 11 


m Acts i. 9. 


t Constr. ad sensum. 


The vss. on the 


2 Read ev (om. ev CP, 1, etc., Tr., WH ?) αντοις A, min. (5), Arm., vg., Anda, 
Lach., Al. Ti., Ws., Bs. (cf. Luke ix. 46), which has been early improved into ets 


(SQ, etc., Bj.) or ew (min. 5) avTovs. 
3 For ἡκουσαν ( 


*ACP, vg., Ti., Tr., WH, Ws., Sw., Bj.) ἤκουσα (NCQ, etc., Me., 


And., Areth., Tic.) is read by some (e.g., Al., de Wette, Diist., Bs., Lind., Wellh.). 


Ver. 10. So far from laying it to heart 
that the godly perish, men are hyper- 
bolically represented as congratulating 
one another on getting rid of these ob- 
noxious prophets with their vexatious 
words (3) and works (6), which hitherto 
had baffled opposition (4, 5). Another 
naive Oriental touch is that their victims 
exchange presents in order to celebrate 
the festive occasion. 

Ver. 12. After being resuscitated, they 
ascend in a cloud (like Enoch and Jesus) 
before the eyes of their enemies (unlike 
Jesus). 

Ver. 13. On earthquakes as a punish- 
ment for sin, cf. Jos. Ant. ix. το, 4= 
Zech. xiv. 5, and (for Sodom) Amos iv. 
11. The beast, as in 2 Thess. ii. 9-12, 
gets off scatheless in the meantime, 
though his tools are punished or terrified 
into reverence (Jonah iii. 5-10).—évépara 
a. Briggs ingeniously conjectures that 


this is a clumsy version of FAW IWIN 
=men of name or fame (cf. 1 Chron. v. 


24, Num. xvi. 2). From this point till 
xvi. Ig and xx. g Jerusalem seems to 
be ignored among the wider political 
oracles, except incidentally at xiv. 20 
(see note), where another erratic block 
from the same or a similar cycle of 
eschatological tradition breaks the sur- 
rounding strata of prediction. 

The ample and proleptic style of the 
next passage shows that the author has 
left his source in order to resume matters 
with (14-18) the seventh trumpet-blast 
or third woe, which ushers in the final 
stage (1 Cor. xv. 52) of the divine pur- 
pose (x. 7=xii.-xx). But what imme- 
diately follows is, by anticipation, a 
celestial reflex of the last judgment which 
is characteristically deferred till ‘the 
various underplots of God’s providence ”’ 
(Alford) are worked out. The announce- 
ment of it starts an exultant song of praise 
in heaven. 


Ver. 15. The rout of Satan (xii. το and 
xx. 4-10) means the absolute messianic 


420 


u Sing. only 
here:= 
β. ἐπιτ.κιν 
Xvii, 18, 
cf. Obad. 
aI, 

v (Possess. 
genit.) 


Ὑ Χριστοῦ αὐτοῦ, 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ΙΏΑΝΝΟΥ 


ΧΙ. 


““ Ἐγένετο ἡ ἣ βασιλεία τοῦ “ κόσμου τοῦ * Κυρίου ἡμῶν καὶ τοῦ 


lol 3) 
Καὶ * βασιλεύσει εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων. 


16. ᾿ Καὶ οἱ εἴκοσι τέσσαρες πρεσβύτεροι οἱ ἐνώπιον τοῦ Θεοῦ 


from Ps. κάθηνται ' ἐπὶ τοὺς θρόνους αὐτῶν, “ἔπεσαν "ἐπὶ τὰ πρόσωπα αὐτῶν 


11. 2, 6, 


Ν -“ ~ 4 
quot. also καὶ προσεκύνησαν τῷ Θεῷ, λέγοντες, 


in Actsiv. ae pnt pita Ἶ ide 
26;cf.Ps) 17. Εὐχαριστοῦμεέν σοι, “ Κύριε 6 Θεὸς 6 παντοκράτωρ, 
ΧΧΙΪ. 29, 
and Isa. ὃ dv καὶ 6 ἦν, 
lii. 7.8; 
God's ὅτι ὅ εἴληφας τὴν δύναμίν σου Thy μεγάλην, 
reign 
yeaa in καὶ * ἐβασίλευσας. 
Apoc. xix. 
ἜΝ 18. καὶ τὰ ἔθνη “ ὠργίσθησαν, 
w Ps. (x.) a 4% ε 9 , 
16; ¢f..on καὶ ἦλθεν ἡ ὀργή σου, 
Acts iii. Leg δὲ ΤΩ na ¢ θῇ 
18, Dal- καὶ 6 ‘Kkaipds τῶν νεκρῶν * κριθῆναι, 
ni. an A A 
oy καὶ ‘ δοῦναι τὸν ὅ μισθὸν " τοῖς δούλοις σου τοῖς ἢ προφήταις, 
x Dan. 11. ae | , Ν ak , s ko» 1 a 
44, vii. 45 καὶ τοῖς ᾿ ἁγίοις καὶ τοῖς “ φοβουμένοις τὸ " ὄνομά σου, ‘Tots 
quot. i κα ἈΠ en 2 
ἐπ ΕΗ μικροῖς καὶ τοῖς μεγάλοις, 
+ ple καὶ ™SrapGetpar τοὺς διαφθείροντας τὴν yay.” 
Ζ Ὁ 10, V 
9 14. = > a ee Ft . 
a ce b Common at open. of votive inscriptions (Asia Minor). 
xix. 6. 


as 2 Sam. xvi. 8, éBac.=“‘is king”. 
ὀργιζέσθωσαν λαοί. 


ci. 8, xvi. 7, xviii. 8, 


ἃ Inceptive aor. cf. Luke xv. 32, 1 Cor. iv. 8, Burton 54. From Ps. xcii. xciii.) 1 where, 

e xii.17. From Ps. ii., xcviii. xcix., κύριος ἐβασίλευσε, 
f Constr. Rom. ix. 21 (ἐξουσία... i 
Esth. ii. 12 οὗτος δὲ ἦν ὁ καιρὸς κορασίου εἰσελθεῖν. 


++ ποιῆσαι); = ἵνα κριθῶσιν x.7.A. See 
g xxii. 12 (not elsewhere in Apoc.). hx. 


7; prophets and saints = Christendom, as i. 1-2, cf. on xviii. 20 and 24. From Dan. ix 6, 10, etc. 


i Always in Apoc.=Christians, never angels (cf. xiv. 10). 


on xix. 5; also 2 Cor. vii. 1. 


Ps. cxv. 13: quot. in xiii. 16, xix. 5, xx. 12. 


k Here only, N.T.; cf. xiv. 7, xv. 4, and 
M Viii. 9, cf. om 


xix. 2. For double sense of word( “" destroy" and ‘ corrupt”) compare Eng. usage of “ruin”. 


1 For καθημενοι (AP, 1, etc., Al. Lach., WH, Sw., Ws., Bs.) Ti., Tr., Bj. rightly 
read (οι) καθηνται $*CQ, etc., Syr., S., Ande, Areth., vg., Pr. 
2 Lach., Tr., WH, Sw. read Tous μικρους και τους peyadous (NQ*AC). 


(6 X. only in these sections= ‘‘ messiah "ἢ 
in the eschatological sense) authority of 
God, as the destruction or submission of 
paganism (cf. ver. 13) means the true 
coming of the eschatological βασιλεία 
(cf. xix. 1-6, after Rome’s downfall). 
The apocalyptic motto is not so much 
“The Lord reigns,” as “‘ The Lord is to 
reign’’. Meanwhile he overrules, and 
every preliminary judgment shoots the 
pious mind forward to anticipate the final 
triumph. Linguistically τοῦ Χριστοῦ 
might mean here as in Hab. iii. 13 God’s 
chosen people, but the usage of the 
Apocalypse puts this out of the question. 
There is no need to delete the words here 
as a gloss (so, ¢.g., Baljon, von Soden, 
Rauch) or the similar phrase in En. xlviii. 
to (with Dalman). 

Ver. 17. ὁ ἐρχόμενος is naturally omit- 
ted from this paean; God has already 
come! The variation of order in i. 4 
and iv. 8 has no occult significance. The 


phrase Lord God is considered by Philo: 
(on Gen. vii. 5) specially applicable to: 
seasons of judgment; Lord precedes God, 
since the former signifies not beneficence 
but “‘royal and destructive power ’”’. 
Ver. 18. @py.=defiant rage (cf. xvi. 
11), not the mere terror of vi. 17, at the 
messianic ὀργή. The prophets are as 
usual the most prominent of the ἅγιοι. 
If the καὶ after ἁγίοις is retained, it is 
epexegetic (as in Gen. iv. 4, Gal. vi. 16), 
not a subtle mark of division between 
Jewish and Gentile Christians (Volter) or 
(ina Jewish source) saints and proselytes. 
The same interpretation (for φοβ. cf. 
Introd. § 6) must be chosen, if καὶ is. 
omitted (as, e.g., by Bousset and Baljon), 
but the evidence is far too slight to 
justify the deletion.—8.ag@. ‘* When 
Nero perished by the justest doom/Which 
ever the destroyer yet destroyed” (By- 
ron). Contrast the exultant tone of ‘this. 
retrospective thanksgiving with the strain’ 


o—I19Q. 


c 


19. Kal " ἠνοίγη 6 ναὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ ὁ 


καὶ ὥφθη ἡ " κιβωτὸς τῆς διαθήκης αὐτοῦ ἐν τῷ ναῷ αὐτοῦ " 


of foreboding which is sounded in xii. 12 
before the actual conflict. 

Ver. 19 introduces xii. 1-18; all that 
the prophet can speak of, from his 
own experience (7. xiii. I, II, εἶδον), 
are the two θηρία on earth, but their 
activity in these latter days is not 
intelligible except as the result of mys- 
terious movements in heaven. The 
latter he now outlines (cf. ὥφθη xi. το, 
xii. I, 3. By whom ?) in order to com- 
fort Christians by the assurance that the 
divine conqueror of these θηρία was in 
readiness tointervene. The celestial (con- 
trast xi. I) ναός, presupposed in the 
scenery of iv.-vi., is now mentioned for 
the first time; its opening reveals the 
long lost κιβωτὸς τῆς διαθήκης, and is 
accompanied by the usual storm-theo- 
phany, marking a decisive moment. 
Jewish tradition had for long cherished 
the belief (cf. on ii. 17) that the restora- 
tion of the people (gathered by God, cf. 
xiv. 1 f.) in the last days would be accom- 
panied by the disclosure of the sacred box 
or ark (in a cloud; cf. here the lightning 
and thunder) which, together with the 
tabernacle and the altar of incense, had 
been safely concealed in Mount Nebo. 
So, e.g., Abarbanel (on 1 Sam. iv. 4: haec 
est arca quam abscondit ante uastationem 
temipli nostri et haec arca futuro tem- 
pore adueniente messia nostro manifesta- 
bitur). Epiphanius repeats the same rabbi- 
nical tradition (καὶ ἐν ἀναστάσει πρῶτον ἣ 
κιβωτὸς ἀναστήσεται). The underlying 
idea was that the disappearance of the 
ark from the holy of holies (Jer. iii. 16; 
4 Esd. x. 22; Jos. Bell. v. 5. 5) was a 
temporary drawback which had to be 
righted before the final bliss could be 
consummated. This legend explains the 
symbolism of the Jewish Christian pro- 
phet. The messianic crisis is really at 
hand! The dawn may be cold and 
stormy, but it is the dawn of the last 
day! The spirit and content of the 
passage are transcendental ; it is prosaic 
to delete ἐν τ. 6. (Spitta, and Cheyne in 
E. Bi. i. 309) and refer the vision to the 
earthly temple in Jerusalem. Like the 
author of Hebrews, this writer views 
heaven under the old ritual categories; 

_ besides, the originals of the sacred things 
were supposed to exist in the heaven of 
God (Heb. viii. 5). 

This overture leads up to two sagas 

NOL, V. 


AILOKAAY¥IZ LQANNOY 


> ~ > ~ 
ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ, 


42ι 


n On form, 
see 
Deissm. 
189. 

o Heb. ix. 

4:elsewh. = Noah's ark in N.T. 


(xii. and xiii.) which explain that the 
present trouble of Christians was simply 
a final phase of the long antagonism 
which had begun in heaven and was soon 
to be ended on earth. It is the writer’s 
task ‘‘not only to announce the future but 
also (i. 19) to convey aright understanding 
of that present on which the future de- 
pends” (Weiss). Hence the digression 
or retrospect in xii. 1 f. is only apparent. 
Hitherto only hints of persecution have 
been given; now the course, methods, 
and issues of the campaign are unfolded. 
The messianic positiog of Jesus is really 
the clue to the position of affairs, and it 
is of the utmost (μέγα, ver. 1=weighty 
and decisive) moment to have all events 
focussed in the light of the new situation 
which that position has created. So 
much is plain. But that the source (or 
tradition) with its goddess-mother, perse- 
cuting dragon, celestial conflict, and 
menaced child, did not emanate from the 
prophet himself is evident alike from its 
style and contents ; these show that 
while it could be domiciled on Jewish 
Christian soil it was not autochthonous 
(cf. Vischer, 19 f.; Gunkel, S. C. 173 f.). 
The imagery is not native to messianism. 
It bears traces of adaptation from mytho- 
logy. Thus, where it would have been 
apposite to bring in the messiah (ver. 7), 
Michael’s réle is retained, even by the 
Christian editor, while the general ori- 
ental features of the mother’s divine 
connexion and her flight, the dragon’s 
hostility and temporary rout, and the 
water-flood, are visible through the Jew- 
ish transformation of the myth into a 
sort of allegory of messiah, persecuted 
by the evil power which he was destined 
to conquer. ‘“‘In reality it is the old 
story of the conflict between light and 
darkness, order and disorder, transferred 
to the latter days, and adapted by spirit- 
ualisation . . . to the wants of faithful 
Jews” (Cheyne, Bible Problems, 80). 
While the vision represents the messianic 
adaptation of a sun-myth, it is uncertain 
what the particular myth was, and. 
whether the vision represents a Jewish 
source worked over by the prophet. In 
the latter case, the Christian redactor’s 
hand is visible perhaps in 4 a and 5 (πρὸς 
τ. θ. αὐτοῦ, cf. v. 6), certainly in rr 
(which, even apart from the Lamb, in- 
terrupts the sequence) and 17 ¢, if not 


27 


422 


piv. 5, Vili. 
5 f., xvi. 
18-21. 

q Indivi- 
dual (as 
vi. 14, etc.), not generic as Mark xiii. 8. 


also in the whole of 10-12. If, in addition 
to this, the source was originally written 
in Hebrew, traces of the translator 
are to be found (so Gunkel, Kohler, 
and Wellhausen, after Ewald, Bruston, 
Briggs, and Schmidt) in 2 (Bac. τεκεῖν, 


cf. τ Sam. iv. 19 FJ sr) 5 
(υἱὸν & -- 5) 3} (ὅπου... . ἐκεῖ -- 
Ow ὍΝ), 8 ὦ. οὐκ τ-- 550 dy 
cf. 14 and on iii. 8), ο (the old serpent= 
OPT οἵ PWN wr) 
possibly τὸ (κατήγωρ -- “Ἴ}72}}) and 
12 (κατέβη, cf. ἐβλήθη of το--"1."). 
But whether the source was written or 
not, whether (if written) it was in Greek 
or not, and whether it was Jewish or 
Jewish-Christian, the clue to the vision 
lies in the sphere of comparative religion 
rather than of literary criticism. Its 
atmosphere has been tinged by the inter- 
national myth of a new god challenging 
and deposing an older, or rather of a 
divine hero or child menaced at birth—a 
myth which at once reflected the dangers 
run by the seed sown in the dark earth 
and also the victory of light (or the god 
of light) over darkness, or of light in the 
springtide over the dead winter. The 
Babylonian myth of Marduk, which 
lacks any analogous tale of Marduk’s 
birth, does not correspond so aptly to 
this vision (cf. Introd. § 4 δ), as does 
the well-known crude Egyptian myth 
(Bousset); Isis is a closer parallel than 
Ishtar, and still closer perhaps at one 
point is the κουροτρόφος of Hellenic 
mythology, who was often represented 
as uirgo coelestis. But, if any local 
phase of the myth is to be assumed as 
having coloured the messianic tradition 
used by John, that of Leto would be 
particularly intelligible to Asiatic readers 
(cf., @.g., Pfleiderer, Early Christ. Con- 
ception of Christ, 56 f., after Dieterich’s 
Abraxas, 117 f.; Maas, Orpheus, 251 f.). 
The dragon Python vainly persecuted her 
before the birth of Apollo; but she was 
caught away to a place of refuge, and 
her divine child, three days later, re- 
turned to slay the monster at Parnassus. 
This myth of the pregnant and threat- 
ened goddess-mother was familiar not 
only in Delos but throughout the districts, 
¢.g., Of Miletus and Magnesia, where 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LOANNOY 


ΧΙ. 


καὶ ἐγένοντο ἢ" ἀστραπαὶ καὶ φωναὶ καὶ βρονταὶ καὶ “ σεισμὸς 


καὶ χάλαζα μεγάλη. 


the fugitive goddess was honoured on 
the local coinage. Coins of Hadrian’s 
reign associate the myth with Ephesus 
(EPECIQN AHTQ). At Hierapolis, ‘the 
story of the life of these divine person- 
ages formed the ritual of the Phrygian 
religion” (C. B. P. i. gt f.) ; the birth of 
a god is associated with Laodicea, one 
coin representing an infant god in the 
arms of a woman (Persephone) ; while in 
the legend of Rhea, as Ramsay points 
out (C. B. P. i. 34), Crete and Phrygia 
are closely allied (cf. also Sib. Orac. v. 
130 f.). All this points decisively to the 
Hellenic form of the myth as the imme- 
diate source of the symbolic tradition 
(so, e.g., J. Weiss, Abbott, 99), though 
here as elsewhere in the Apocalypse the 
obscurity which surrounds the relations 
between Jewish or early Christian escha- 
tology and the ethnic environment ren- 
ders it difficult to determine the process 
of the latter’s undoubted influence on the 
former. Fortunately, this is a matter of 
subordinate importance. The essential 
thing is to ascertain not the soil on 
which such messianic conceptions grew, 
but the practical religious object to 
which the Christian prophet, as editor, 
has freely and naively applied them. 
His design is to show that the power of 
Satan on earth is doomed. Experience 
indeed witnesses (12-17) to his malice 
and mischief, but the present outburst 
of persecution is only the last campaign 
of a foe whose efforts have been already 
baffled and are soon to be crushed in the 
inexorable providence of God. The pro- 
phet dramatically uses his source or 
tradition to introduce Satan as a baffled 
opponent of the messiah (cf. on xi. 7), 
who is simply making the most of his 
time (ver. 12). Moriturus mordet. Once 
this cardinal aim of the piece is grasped 
—and the proofs of it are overflowing— 
the accessory details fall into their proper 
place, just as in the interpretation of the 
parables. In all such products of the 
poetical and religious imagination, pic- 
turesque items, which were necessary to 
the completeness and impressiveness of 
the sketch, are not to be invested with 
primary significance. Besides, in the 
case of an old story or tradition which 
had passed through successive phases, it 
was inevitable that certain traits should 
lose much if not all of their meaning. 





ὙΦ ΟΝ, 


XII. 


βεβλημένη τὸν ὃ" ἥλιον----καὶ ἣ σελήνη ὑποκάτω τῶν ποδῶν αὐτῆς, 


“These ancient trazts, fragments of an 
earlier whole, which lack their proper 
connexion in the present account, and 
indeed are scarcely intelligible, as they 
have been wrested from the thought- 
sequence of the original writer, reveal to 
the expert the presence of an earlier form 
of the story” (S. C. p. 6.) 

CHArTER X1iI.—The procedure of the 
writer here is very much the same as 
inch. xi. (see above). The oracle of xii. is 
not an allegorising version of history, nor 
an exegetical construction of O.T. texts, 
nor a free composition of the author, but 
the Christianised reproduction of a Jewish 
source (possibly from the same period as 
the basis of xi. 1-13, or at least from the 
same βιβλαρίδιον), or at any rate a 
tradition, which described the birth of 
messiah in terms borrowed from such 
cosmological myths as that of the con- 
flict between the sun-god and the dragon 
of darkness and the deep. The psycho- 
logical origin of such a Jewish adapta- 
tion would be explained if we presupposed 
a tradition similar to that of the later 
Talmud (Jer. Berach. fol. 5, 1) which 
described the messiah as born at Bethle- 
hem and swept away from his mother by 
a storm-wind, just after the fall of Jeru- 
salem. But this messiah is merely re- 
moved, not raised to heaven. And as 
we have no clear evidence that the stress 
of 68-70 A.D. excited such a messianic 
hope among the Pharisees, it is hazard- 
ous to use this (as ¢.g., Jiilicher and 
Wellhausen still do) to prove that the 
date of the source is the same as that of 
xi. 1f. The structure of the passage is 
equally ambiguous. 4 a presupposes 
something equivalent to ver. 7-9, while 
13-16 is an expansion or variant of 6; 
and yet 13 is the natural sequel to 9 
(12). These features have led to a 
variety of literary reconstructions. Spitta, 
¢.g., takes ver. 6 as the Christian edi- 
torial anticipation of 13 f., and finds 
another Christian touch in ver. 11 (Wey- 
landin 11 and 17¢). J. Weiss puts 1-6 
and 13-17 together, regarding 7-12 as 
an independent continuation of the third 
woe (editorial notes in 3, rz, and τῇ). 
Wellhausen (Analyse, 18 f) bisects the 
oracle into two parallel but incomplete 
variants (A=1-6, B=7-9, 13, 14), with 
15-17 as an editorial conclusion. Others 
(e.g., Sch6n and Calmes) find a Christian 


AITOKAAY¥IZ IQANNOY 


423 


I. Kat "σημεῖον μέγα ὥφθη ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ, γυνὴ ἢ περι- a» Matt. 


XXiv. 30, 
aril. 
att. ii. 2. 
b Ps. civ. 2. 


editor only in 10-12 (with 17 ¢ of course)? 
while Weizsacker regards 13-18 as the 
expansion of I-12 (a Jewish-Christian 
fragment of 64-66 a.p.). Some of the 
incoherencies of the description are due, 
however, to the alterations necessitated 
by messianic belief in the circle of such 
ethnic traditions. The latter made the 
mother’s flight precede the child’s birth 
(as in4, 5). But, on the messianic scheme, 
it was the child’s birth which roused the 
full fury of the enemy and turned it into an 
outburst of baffled revenge upon the 
mother (6, 13 f.), after the child’s escape. 
Furthermore, this activity of the devil on 
earth had to be accounted for by his dis- 
lodgement from heaven, as a result of 
the messianic child’s elevation to heaven 
(7 f.). Hence the apparent inconsist- 
encies, the shifting standpoint, and the 
amount of repetition and confusion are 
due to the presence of a messianic con- 
ception employing terms of earlier and 
inadequate mythology for its own pur- 
poses, rather than to any literary re- 
arrangement such as the transposition of 
part of the trumpet-visions to 7-12 (Sim- 
cox, J. Weiss). The interest of the pro- 
phet in this source or tradition, as in that 
of xi. I-13, centres in the outburst of the 
evil power which shows that the end is 
imminent. There the beast’s attack on 
messiah’s heralds is ultimately foiled. 
Here the dragon’s attack on messiah 
himself is not only defeated but turned 
into a rout which obliges him to shift 
the scene of his campaign to a field 
where his deputies are presently to be 
annihilated. 

Vv. 1-2. ἐν τ. ov. almost=‘‘in the 
sky ” (cf. ver. 4.). A Greek touch: cf. 
Hom. Jliad, ii. 308, ἔνθ᾽ ἐφάνη μέγα σῆμα" 
δράκων ἐπὶ νῶτα δαφοινός (i.e. fiery-red). 
Here as elsewhere mythological traits of 
the original source are left as impressive 
and decorative details. The nearest 
analogy is the Babylonian Damkina, 
mother of the young god Marduk and 
‘“‘ queen of the heavenly tiara” (z.e., the 
stars, cf. Schrader, pp. 360, 361). For 
Hebrew applications of the symbolism ¢/. 
Gen. xxxvii. 9, 10 and Test. Naph. 5 
(καὶ Ἰούδας ἦν λαμπρὸς ὡς ἡσελήνη 
καὶ ὑπὸ τοὺς πόδας αὐτοῦ ἦσαν ιβ΄ 
ἀκτῖνες). The Egyptian Osiris was also 
wrapt in a flame-coloured robe—the sun 
being the ‘‘ body” of deity (Plut. de Iside. 


424 


o 


in Apoc. 
is επί 
with gen. , es 
οἰ κεφαλή. TEKELV. 

d Isa. xxvi. ¢ Η ; τ 
17, Μῖς. TUPPOS μέγας, ἐχὼν 
lv. 10. = 

« Obj. infin. τὰς κεφαλὰς αὐτοῦ ἑπτὰ 
of ‘desire , 
implied in TO 
preced. 
ptcc”’ 
(Burton, 


389). i : 
f Ezek. xxix. 3; only in Apoc. in N.T. 
Dan. vii. 7. 


AIIOKAAY¥VIZ IQANNOY 


g cf. vi. 4. 
k Only in Apoc. in N.T., cf. xix. 12, xiii. 1. 


X1L 


Only here καὶ “ ἐπὶ “τῆς “κεφαλῆς αὐτῆς στέφανος ἀστέρων δώδεκα---2. καὶ 
ἐν γαστρὶ ἔχουσα: καὶ ἅ κράζει 1 “ ὠδίνουσα καὶ βασανιζομένη 
3. Καὶ ὥφθη ἄλλο σημεῖον ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ, καὶ ἰδοὺ * δράκων 
Ὁ κεφαλὰς ἑπτὰ καὶ ' κέρατα δέκα: καὶ ἐπὶ 
"διαδήματα: 4. καὶ i οὐρὰ αὐτοῦ σύρει 
τρίτον τῶν ἀστέρων τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, καὶ ἔβαλεν αὐτοὺς εἰς τὴν γῆν. 
καὶ ὃ δράκων | ἕστηκεν ἐνώπιον τῆς γυναικὸς τῆς μελλούσης ™ τεκεῖν; 


h Ps. Ixxiv. 13-14. i From 
1 For form cf. Win. § 14, 14. 


fa τεκεῖν incorrectly for τίκτειν ; τέκῃ (cf. xi. 7), on mood see Burton, 303, 305. 


1 Read και (NVC, Aeth., Pr., S., etc.) paler (NAP, 1, etc., Hipp.), edd. 


51). The original figure was that of Israel 
personified as a pregnant goddess-mother, 
but it probably represented to the prophet 
the true Israel or Zion of God (Wernle, 
276-288) in which his Christ had been 
born (cf. John xvi. 21, with John xiv. 30, 
also En. xc. 37). The idealisation was 
favoured by the current conceptions of 
Zion as pre-existent in heaven (cf. xix. 8, 
xxi. 8, and Apoc. Bar. iv. = widow) and 
as a mother (4 Esd. ix. 38-x. 59). The 
prophet views the national history of 
Israel as a long preparation for the 
anguish and woe out of which the mes- 
siah was to come. ‘‘Tantae molis erat 
Christianam condere gentem” (Grotius). 
The idea is echoed in Ep. Lugd., where 
the church is “the virgin mother”. The 
virgin-birth falls into the background here 
as in the Fourth Gospel, though for dif- 
ferent reasons. The messiah of Apoc. 
xii. is not the son of Mary but simply 
born in the messianic community, and 
the description is no more than a trans- 
cendental version of what Paul notes in 
Rom. ix. 4,5. The editor’s interest lies 
not in the birth of messiah so much as 
in the consequences of it in heaven and 
earth. At the same time the analogies 
discovered between Cerinthus and this 
passage (by Volter and others) are wholly 
imaginary (Kohlhofer, 53 f.). 

Ver. 3. muppds: Vergil’s serpents 
which attack Laokoon have blood-red 
crests, and Homer‘s dragon has a blood- 
red back, but here the trait (cf. above) is 
reproduced from the red colour of Typhon, 
the Egyptian dragon who persecuted 
Osiris (Plut. de Iside, 30-33). The seven 
heads are taken from the seven-headed 
hydra or muSmahhu of Babylonian my- 
thology. The devil’s deputy in xiii. 1 
(= the composite muSruSSu of Babylonia) 
has the same equipment of horns and 
heads, but the diadems adorn his horns. 


Here, to John’s mind at any rate (cf. ver. 
g), the dragon is not equivalent to any 
contemporary pagan power like Pompey 
(Ps. Sol. ii. 29) or the king of Babylon. 

Ver. 4. The symbolism is a reminis- 
cence of an etiological myth in astrology 
(cf. the cauda of the constellation Scorpio) 
and of the primitive view which regarded 
the dark cloud as a snake enfolding the 
luminaries of heaven in its hostile coils 
(Job iii. 8, xxvi. 13, with A. B. Davidson’s. 
notes). Thus the Iranians (S. B. E. iv. 
p- lxxiii., Darmesteter) described the 
fiend as a serpent or dragon not on the 
score of craftiness but ‘‘ because the 
storm fiend envelops the goddess of light 
with the coils of the cloud as with a 
snake’s fold”. The same play of imagi- 
nation would interpret eclipses and fall- 
ing stars, and, when the pious were 
compared to stars (as in Egyptian theo- 
logy, Plut. de Iside, 21), it was but a 
step to the idea of Dan. viii. (cf. Sib. 
Or. v. 512 f., the battle of the stars), 
where Antiochus Epiphanes does violence 
to some devout Israelites who are char- 
acterised as stars flung rudely down to 
earth (i.e., martyred, 1 Macc. i.)  Ori- 
ginally, this description of the dragon 
lashing his tail angrily and sweeping 
down a third of the stars probably re- 
ferred to the seduction of angels from 
their heavenly rank (so 8-9) to serve his. 
will (Weiss). But John, in recasting the 
tradition, may have thought of the 
Danielic application, i.¢., of the devil 
succeeding in crushing by martyrdom a 
certain number of God’s people. In this 
event, they would include at least, if 
they are not to be identified with, the 
pre-Christian martyrs of Judaism (cf. 
Heb. xi. 32 f. Matt. xxiii. 35).---ἔστηκεν,. 
a conventional posture of the ancient 
dragon cf. e.g., Pliny, H. N. viii. 3, “πες 
flexu multiplici ut reliquae serpentes cor- 


2—6. 


iva ὅταν ™téxy τὸ τέκνον αὐτῆς " καταφάγῃ. 
ἄρσενα, ὃς μέλλει “ ποιμαίνειν πάντα τὰ ἔθνη ἐν ῥάβδῳ 
καὶ Ῥ ἡρπάσθη τὸ τέκνον αὐτῆς πρὸς τὸν θεὸν καὶ πρὸς τὸν θρόνον 


αὐτοῦ. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


425 


5. Καὶ ἔτεκεν υἱόν πα Matt. ii. 
ie 16-20, 

° σιδηρᾷ" Luke xiii. 

30-31, 

Acts iv. 

25-27. 


6. καὶ ἡ γυνὴ “ ἔφυγεν εἰς τὴν ἔρημον, ὅπου ἔχει ἐκεῖ o ii. 27, xix. 


im A A 15; Cf. 
τόπον ἡτοιμασμένον ἀπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ, ἵνα ἐκεῖ " τρέφωσιν αὐτὴν " ἡμέρας Si. ΤῊ 


χιλίας διακοσίας ἑξήκοντα. 


17, 1 Cor. xii. 2, 4. 


q Matt. ii. 13, cf. Ps. Sol. xvii. 9. 


viii. 196 f. 
p Acts viii. 
39, I 
Thess. iv. 
τ (= τρέφεται, 14) for constr. see x. 


11, Win. § 5, 20 f., Moult. i. 58-59. How? with heavenly food, like ancient Israel (Ps. Ixxviii. 24, 


cv: 40)? s Cf. on xi. 2-3. 


1 Read apoeva P, 95, Meth., Andbav (Ws., Bs.) for the solecistic αρσεν (AC’ 
Lach., Ti., Tr., Al. Sw., WH) [appeva (the Attic form, Thumb 77, Helbing 20) 


SQ, 1, etc., Areth., Bj.]: a. (Vict.) or v. (Pr.) a redundant gloss ὃ 


Wetstein cites 


a verbal parallel from Aristoph., Eccles., 549-550 (ἄρρεν yap ἔτεκε παιδίον . ἧκκλη- 


aia;). 


pus impellit, sed celsus et erectus in 
medio incedens”; ibid. viii. 14, for ser- 
pents devouring children. The mother 
of Zoroaster had also a vision of wild 
beasts waiting to devour her child at its 
birth. This international myth of the 
divine child menaced at birth readily lent 
itself to moralisation, or afforded terms 
for historical applications, e.g., the abor- 
tive attack on Moses, the prototype of 
messiah (Baldensperger, 141, 142) at his 
birth (Ac. vii. 20 f.) and the vain efforts 
of Herod against the messiah. The 
animosity of Pytho for Leto was due to 
a prophecy that the latter’s son would 
vanquish him. 

Ver. 5. In accordance with the rab- 
binic notion which withdrew messiah 
for a time, the infant, like a second 
Moses, is caught up out of harm’s 
way. He has no career on earth at all. 
This is intelligible enough in a Jewish 
tradition; but while no Christian pro- 
phet could have spontaneously depicted 
his messiah in such terms, even under 
the exigencies of apocalyptic fantasy, the 
further problem is to understand how he 
could have adopted so incongruous and 
inadequate an idea except as a pictorial 
detail. The clue lies in the popular 
messianic interpretation of passages like 
Ps. ii. where messiah’s birth is really his 
inauguration and enthronement. The 
early application of this to Jesus, though 
not antagonistic to an interest in his his- 
toric personality, tallied with the wide- 
spread feeling (cf. note on i. 7) that his 
final value lay in his return as messiah. 
Natiuitas quaedam eius ascensio: “‘ The 
heavens must receive him” (Acts iii. 
21) till the divine purpose was ripe 
enough for his second advent. This 


ν᾿ 


Cf. Cooke’s North Semitic Inscript., 221-222. 


tendency of primitive Jewish Christianity 
serves to explain how John could refer in 
passing to his messiah in terms which 
described a messiah, as Sabatier remarks, 
sans la croix et sans la mort, and which 
even represented his ascension as an 
escape rather than a triumph. The ab- 
sence of any allusion to the Father is not 
due so much to any reluctance on the pro- 
phet’s part to call Jesus by the name of 
Son of God (cf. ii. 18), which pagan usage 
had profaned not only in such mythical 
connexion but in the vocabulary of the 
Imperial cultus, as to the fact that the 
mythical substratum always gave special 
prominence to the mother; the goddess- 
mother almost invariably displaced the 
father in popular interest, and indeed 
bulked more largely than even the child. 

Ver. 6. ἀπὸ κ-.τιλ.,-- ὑπό of agent (so 
Acts ii. 22, iv. 36, etc., Ps. Sol. xv. 6, 
and a contemporary inscription in Ditten- 
berger’s Sylloge Inscr. 655° συντετηρ- 
ἡμένα ἀπὸ βασιλέων καὶ Σεβαστῶν) only 
here in Apocalypse. On the flight of the 
faithful to the wilderness, a stereotyped 
feature of the antichrist period, cf. A. C. 
211 f. Apocalyptic visions, particularly 
in the form of edited sources or adapted 
traditions, were not concerned to pre- 
serve strict coherency in details or con- 
sistency in situation. Thus it is not clear 
whether the ἔρημος was conceived to 
exist in heaven, or whether heaven is 
the background rather than the scene of 
what transpires. What follows in 7-12 
is the description (from the popular re- 
ligious version of the source) of what 
John puts from a definitely Christian 
standpoint in iii, 21, v. 5, where (as in 
Asc. Isa. Gk. ii. 9-11) the downfall of 
Satan is ascribed to Jesus himself. 


426 


t Foll. by 
loose in- 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


XII. 


. Kat ἐγένετο ἱπόλεμος ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ: ὁ "Μιχαὴλ καὶ ot 
Y μ' ῳ ρανῷ Xo) 


ΕΣ 5» A a lol : a A ‘ c , 
fin. of εχ- ἄγγελοι αὐτοῦ oi πολεμῆσαι μετὰ τοῦ δράκοντος, καὶ 6 δράκων 


planation 


(cf Moult. ἐπολέμησε καὶ “ot ἄγγελοι αὐτοῦ, 8. “Kai οὐκ ἴσχυσεν, οὐδὲ 


1.217-218). χα 
u From 

Dan. x. 

13, 21, xii. ὃ μέγας, 76 

1, cf. Judez 


wot 

v Matt. xxv. 
41; evil 
beings in 
heaven, 
Asc. Isa. 
vi. οἵ. 


ε 


\ 
και OL 


W cis οὐδὲν δέον συνέβη τελευτῆσαι THY τάξιν αὐτῶν (Papias, cit. Andr.). 
ail. 20, xx. 3, 8, Io. 


56f. y Isa. xxvii. 1. Zz XX. 2. 


€ xi. 15, xix. I. 


τόπος "εὑρέθη αὐτῶν ἔτι ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ. 
ὄφις ὁ ἀρχαῖος, *6 καλούμενος ““Διάβολος,᾽᾽ καὶ 
Σατανᾶς,᾽᾿ ὃ " πλανῶν τὴν οἰκουμένην ὅλην, " ἐβλήθη εἰς τὴν γῆν, 
ἄγγελοι αὐτοῦ μετ᾽ αὐτοῦ ἐβλήθησαν. 
ε φωνὴν “μεγάλην ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ λέγουσαν 


9. καὶ ἐβλήθη ὁ δράκων 


(.ς 


ο 


IO. καὶ ἤκουσα 


x xx. 11, Par. Lost, vi. 
b From Slav. En. xxix. 5. 


1 Read toxvoev (Ps. xii. 5, LXX) A, etc., Me., Aeth., Ande (WH, Ws., Sw., Bs.), 
[verb agreeing as in LXX with principal subject, cf. Vit., ii. 114 f.]. 


Ver. 7. (= 
onbas ona manbdn cnn: 


the nomin. makes this rare use of the 
genit. infin. even more clumsy and irre- 
gular than the similar constr. with accus. 
in Acts x. 25 (where see note). The sense 
is plain, and it is better to put the constr. 
down to syntactical laxity than to con- 
jecture subtle reasons for the blunder or 
to suggest emendations such as the addi- 
tion of ἐγένετο to πόλεμος (Vit. i. 168), or 
of ἦσαν or ἐγένετο before ὁ M. x. οἱ ay. 
αὐτοῦ (Ws., Bousset), the latter being an 
irregular nomin., or the alteration of πολ. 
to ἐπολέμησαν (Diist.) or the simple 
omission of πόλεμος .. . οὐρανῷ. For 
πολ. μετὰ cf. Thumb 125 (a Copticism ?). 
In the present form of the oracle, the 
rapture of messiah seems to have stimu- 
lated the devil to fresh efforts, unless we 
are meant to understand that the initia- 
tive came from Michael and his allies. 
The devil, as the opponent of mankind 
had access to the Semitic heaven, but 
his role here recalls the primitive mytho- 
logical conception of the dragon storming 
heaven (A. C. 146-150). Michael had 
been for over two centuries the patron- 
angel or princely champion of Israel (6 
els τῶν ἁγίων ἀγγέλων ὃς ἐπὶ τῶν τοῦ 
λαοῦ ἀγαθῶν τέτακται, En. xx. 5; cf. A. 
Ο. 227 f.; Lueken 15 f.; Volz 195; R. ¥. 
320 f., and Dieterich’s Abraxas, 122 f.). 
As the protector of Israel’s interests he 
was assigned a prominent réle by Jewish 
and even Christian eschatology in the final 
conflict (cf. Ass. Mos. x. 2). For the 
theory that he was the prince-angel, like 
a son of man (Dan. vii. 13) who subdued 
the world-powers, cf. Grill 55 and Cheyne 
215 f. More generally, a celestial battle. 
as the prelude of messiah’s triumph on 


ἐγένετο . . . TOU 1. 


earth, forms an independent Jewish tradi- 
tion which can be traced to the second 
century B.c. (ef. Sibyll. iii. 795-807, 
2 Macc. v. 2-4; Jos. Bell. vi. 5, 3). ---καὶ 
οἱ ἄγγελοι αὐτοῦ. The only allusion in 
the Apocalypse (cf. even xx. τὶ with 
Matt. xxv. 41) to the double hierarchy of 
angels, which post-exilic Judaism took 
over from Persia (Bund, iii. 11). In the 
Leto-myth, Pytho returns to Parnassus 
after being baffled in his pursuit of the 
pregnant Leto. 


Ver. 9. Δράκων and ὄφις are in the 
LXX interchangeable terms for the levi- 
athan or sea-monster of mythology, who 
is here defined as the old serpent (a rab- 
binical expression, cf. Gfrorer, i. 386-389) ; 
so Tiamat, the primaeval rebel, as dragon 
and serpent (cf. Rohde’s Psyche, 371) 
had been identified in JE’s paradise- 
story with the malicious and envious 
devil (Sap. ii. 24; En. xx. 7; Test. Reub. 
5). The opponent of God was th- adver- 
sary of man (cf. Oesterley’s Evol. of 
Mess. Idea, 176 f.). Two characteristic 
traits of Satan are blended here: (a) 
cunning exercised on men to lure them 
into ruin (πλανῶν, x.t.X., cf. 2 Cor. ii. 11, 
xi. 3), and (δ) eagerness to thwart and 
slander them before God (ver. 10, cf. En. 
xl. 7; Zech. iii. r f.). The second is 
naive and archaic, of course, in a Chris- 
tian apocalypse. 


Ver. το. κατήγωρ (349 9) is the 
counterpart to the rabbinic (Lueken 22) 
title of συνήγορος given to Michael as a 
sort of Greatheart or advocate and pro- 
tector of men (En. xl. 9). The Aramaic 
derivation of the word (Win. § 8. 13) is 
not absolutely necessary, as the papyri 
show that it might have sprung up on 
Greek soil (cf. Thumb, 126; Rademacher, 


7--14. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


427 


“"Apte ἐγένετο ἡ ὅ σωτηρία καὶ ἡ δύναμις d Gj-on xix. 
> ae ΤᾺ 7 a I; here 
καὶ ἡ βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ ἡμῶν καὶ ἡ ἐξουσία τοῦ " Χριστοῦ alm.= 
τε “victory” 
αὐτοῦ - (1 Sam. 
FA Ἔ HK xix. 5, Ps. 
ott ἐβλήθη ὁ κατήγωρ τῶν ἀδελφῶν ἡμῶν, xx. 7, and 
t = loka le F, γί er er - «  Lukei.71) 
ὁ ᾿ κατηγορῶν αὐτοὺς ἐνώπιον τοῦ θεοῦ ἡμῶν ἡμέρας καὶ sy 
Ι! 
νυκτός. € χὶ “15, cf. 
Ἶ Xx. 4,6 
11. καὶ αὐτοὶ " ἐνίκησαν αὐτὸν ὃ διὰ τὸ αἷμα τοῦ dpviou, (final 
+ Sid τὰ ΤῊΣ Pen 4 Sir ed editor's 
kat διὰ τὸν ᾿ λόγον τῆς ‘paptupias αὐτῶν, ; and). 
A tom Jub, 
καὶ " οὐκ ἠγάπησαν τὴν ψυχὴν αὐτῶν ἄχρι * θανάτου. xlviii. 15, 
a a 18, 
12. διὰ τοῦτο ᾿ εὐφραίνεσθε " οὐρανοὶ Kal ot ἐν αὐτοῖς “oKy-¢g1 johnii. 
ἡ 13-14. 
νουντες. Rom. viii. 
Pe rip ee a en 33°34) 37° 
ovat τὴν γῆν Kal τὴν θάλασσαν, nao 
A lv. Il. 
ὅτι κατέβη ὁ διάβολος πρὸς ὑμᾶς ἔχων θυμὸν μέγαν, ii. 2, vi. 9. 
δι τι es ΓΑ. ” k ii. 10, 
εἰδὼς ὅτι ? ὀλίγον καιρὸν ἔχει. John xii. 
13. Kai ὅτε εἶδεν ὁ δράκων ὅτι ἐβλήθη εἰς τὴν γῆν, ἐδίωξε τὴν ag 
γυναῖκα “ἥτις ἔτεκε τὸν ἄρσενα. 14. καὶ " ἐδόθησαν τῇ γυναικὶ ες μοὶ 


ai δύο πτέρυγες τοῦ ἥ“ ἀετοῦ τοῦ μεγάλου, ἵνα πέτηται εἰς τὴν ἔρημον 


N Xviii. 20, Ps, xcvi. 11; only here (Apoc.) in plural. 


years (6, 14), C/. Xx. 3. q Cf. on i. 7. 


TX. 

m Isa. xlii. 
10f., xliv. 
23)xlix.13. 


O viii. 13, cf. Sib. Or. 111, 323. p = 34 


I Viil. 2, xi. 1, etc., cf. Arist. Hist. Nat. x. 1, Hor. Od. iv. 4. 


1,9, Plut. Timol. xxvi., Jos. Ant. xii. 4, 10, Aesch. Choeph. 239 f., and Dan. vii. 4. 


Rhein. Mus. lvii. 148). On the accuser’s 
role cf. Sohar Levit. fol. 43 (ille semper 
stat tanquam delator coram rege Israelis) 
and the prayer of Jub. i. 20: ‘let not the 
spirit of Beliar rule over them to accuse 
them before thee and to turn them deceit- 
fully from all the paths of righteousness ” 
(wh re both traits are combined, ¢f. 
above on 9). 

Ver. 11. This sentence, like ver. 7, 
suggests that earth’s history is the reflex 
and outcome of transactions in heaven, 
on the common principle of Jalkut Rub. 
(on Exod. xiv. 7) : ‘‘ there was war above 
(in heaven) and war below (on earth), 
and sore was the war in heaven”. 
Satan’s dislodgment from heaven is an- 
other (cf. on xi. 19) sign of messiah’s 
approaching victory (cf. Yasna xxx. 8). 
What Jesus had already seen in his own 
victory over daemons (Matt. xii. 24 f.; 
cf. J. Weiss, Predigt Fesu, 28 f., 89 f.), 
John hails from another standpoint, as 
inaugurating the messianic age. Vezxilla 
vegis prodeunt. How readily the mytho- 
logical trait could be moralised is evident 
from a passage like Rom. viii. 33 f., of 
which Apoc. xii. τα is a realistic variant. 
In the background lie conceptions like 
that of En. xl. 7 where the fourth angel 
of the Presence is heard ‘‘ fending all the 
Satans and forbidding them to appéar be- 


fore the Lord of Spirits to accuse men” 
Ver. 11 chronologically follows ver. 17, 
but the author, by a characteristic and 
dramatic prolepsis, anticipates the tri- 
umph of the martyrs and confessors, who 
refute Satan’s calumnies and resist his 
wiles. In opposition to the contemporary 
Jewish tradition (Ap. Bar. ii. 2, xiv. 12; 
4 Esd. vii. 77, etc.), it is not reliance on 
works but the consciousness of redemp- 
tion which enables them to bear witness 
and to bear the consequences of their wit- 
ness. This victory on earth depends on 
Christ’s previous defeat of evil in the 
upper world (Col. ii. 15; cf. above on ii. 
10, also xxi. 8) which formed its head- 
quarters. 

Ver. 12. εὐφραίνεσθε, cf. the Egyptian 
hymn in honour of Ra, the sun-god: 
‘* Ra hath quelled his impious foes, hea- 
ven rejoices, earth is delighted”.—ovat 
x.t.A. This desperate and last effort of 
Satan is a common apocalyptic feature 
(cf. e.g., 4 Esd. xill. 16 £; Ap. Bar. 
XXVili. 3, xli. 1, Ixxv. 5; Mark xiii. 21; 
Did. xvi.), which John identifies later 
with the Imperial cultus. 

The dragon’s pursuit of the woman 
(13-17) resumes and expands the hint of 
ver. 6. 

Ver. 14. ‘‘The two wings of a huge 
griffon-vulture’’ (τοῦ either generic ar- 


428 


Ss. ver. 6. 
t Dan. vii. 


25 
(Theod.), 


” 


ATIOKAAYY¥VIZ IQANNOY 


Ν o πὲ ὧν Ν lA a 
και ἡμῖσυ καιρου απὸ προσώπου TOU ὄφεως. 


XII. 


> Η , 2 sc , 22074 x Ca ᾿ 
εἰς τὸν TOTTOV QUTNS, οπου τρέφεται €KEL καιρὸν καὶ καιρους 


15. καὶ ἔβαλεν 


Ὁ ε > lol , 3 a> , lol a en ε . , 
xii. 7;= ὁ Odts ἐκ TOU στόματος αὐτοῦ ὀπίσω τῆς γυναικὸς ὕδωρ ὡς ποταμὸν, 


dual 


(Win. § ἵνα αὐτὴν “ ποταμοφόρητον ποιήσῃ. 


27, 5). , 
u Hebraism γυναικι, 


(wT ὃν ἔβαλεν 6 δράκων ἐκ τοῦ στόματος αὐτοῦ. 


16. καὶ ἐβοήθησεν ἡ γῆ τῇ 


καὶ ἤνοιξεν ἡ γῆ τὸ στόμα αὐτῆς καὶ κατέπιε τὸν ποταμὸν 


17. καὶ “ ὠργίσθη ὁ 


5 , sc. 8 n~ , ‘ 2 A x a x , a A 
3p) δράκων ἐπι TH γύναικι, και ἀπῆλθε ποίησαι πόλεμον μετα των 


Ξε "8, 


age λοιπῶν τοῦ 7 σπέρματος αὐτῆς, τῶν * τηρούντων τὰς ἐντολὰς τοῦ θεοῦ 
ν am. Aey. x 
a καὶ "ἐχόντων τὴν μαρτυρίαν ᾿ἸΙησοῦ. 
1 
ἐποίησεν ᾿ A i 
τεἀπόερσεν (Hesych. on Iliad, vi. 348). “Τὸ get her swept away by the stream”. w xi. 18= 
“waxed wroth”. κα χὶ 7: y Cf. 2 John 1, 4, 13; αἰβοι Pet. i. 1-2, iv. 12f. zi John ii. 3, 


iii. z2, 24, 1 Cor. vii. 19. 


ticle, or a Hebraism, or more likely an 
allusion to the mythological basis). In 
traditional mythology the eagle op- 
posed and thwarted the serpent at all 
points (cf. reff.). In the Egyptian myth 
the vulture is the sacred bird of Isis 
(Hathor). Any allusion to Israel’s de- 
liverance (as in Exod. xix. 4; Deut. xxxii. 
II) is at best secondary. 

Ver. 15. Another mythological meta- 
phor for persecution or persecutors, like 
‘torrents of Belial’ (Ps. xvili.4). As the 
primaeval dragon was frequently a sea- 
monster, from Tiamat onwards, his con- 
nexion with water (cf. on viii. 10) was 
a natural development in ancient (cf. 
Pausan. v. 43 f.) and even Semitic (e.g., 
Ps. Ixxiv. 4; Ezek. xxix., xxxii.) literature. 
The serpent in the river was, for Zoro- 
astrians, a creation of the evil spirit 
(Vend. i. 3). 

Ver. 16. The dragon is unexpectedly 
baffled by the earth, as the woman’s 
ally, which swallows the persecutors like 
Korah, Dathan, and Abiram (Num. xvi. 
30-32). This enigmatic detail has not 
yet been paralleled from Jewish or early 
Christian literature, for Protev. facobi, 22 
(cited by Selwyn, 7-9) is even more re- 
mote than 4 Esd. xiii. 44. Probably it was 
retained from the astrological setting of 
the original myth: Cetos, the aquatic 
dragon of the southern heavens, which 
astrologically is a watery region, casts 
forth the river of Eridanos, which is 
swallowed up in the zodiac as it flows 
down the heavens into the underworld. 

Ver. 17. The baffled adversary now 
widens his sphere of operations.—r.A. an 
apocalyptic term = the derelicti or re- 
lictt of 4 Esdras (cf. Volz, 319). These 
represent to the Christian editor the scat- 
tered Christians in the Empire; by add- 
ing this verse (or at least καὶ ἐχ. . . . 
Ἰησοῦ) to the source, he paves the way 


a Vi. 9, Xiv. 12, xix. 10, etc. 


for the following saga of xiii. which de- 
picts the trying situation of Christians 
exposed to the attack of the devil’s de- 
puties. The devil keeps himself in the 
background. He works subtly through 
the Roman power. This onset on the 
faith and faithfulness of Christians by the 
enforcement of the Imperial cultus is 
vividly delineated in Ep. Lugd. which 
incidentally mentions the experience of 
Biblias who, like Cranmer, repented of a 
recantation. ‘‘The devil, thinking he 
had already swallowed up B., one of 
those who had denied Christ, desired to 
condemn her further by means of blas- 
phemy, and brought her to the torture 
[t.e., in order to force false accusations 
from her lips]. . . . But she, reminded by 
her present anguish of the eternal punish- 
ment in Gehenna [cf. Apoc. xiv. g f.], con- 
tradicted the blasphemous slanderers, 
confessed herself a Christian, and was 
added to the order of the martyrs.” 
Blandina, the heroic slave-girl, survived 
several conflicts tva νικήσασα τῷ μὲν 
σκολιῷ ὄφει ἀπαραίτητον ποιήσῃ τὴν 
καταδίκην. 

The keynote of the situation hinted 
in xu. 17 ἢ 15. Struck in x1. δι ἢ 
dragon has given his authority to the 
beast ; what God’s people have now to 
contend with is no longer the O.T. 
Satan merely (xii. 9, 10) but his powerful 
and seductive delegate on earth. In the 
Imperial cultus the Christian prophet 
could see nothing except a supreme and 
diabolically subtle manceuvre of Satan 
himself (cf. on xiii. 1 and 5). The 
Danielic prophecy was at last on he 
verge of fulfilment! Mythological and 
cosmological elements (S. C. 360 f.) 
were already present in the Danielic 
tradition, but the prophet (or the source 
which he edits) readapted them to the 
historical situation created by the ex- 


15—18—XIII. 1—3. 


18. Kat > ἐστάθην] ἐπὶ τὴν ἄμμον τῆς θαλάσσης, XIII. 


AMOKAAY¥VIZ ΙΩΏΑΝΝΟΥ 


429 


I. καὶ ὃ On form, 
cf. Helb- 


"εἶδον ἐκ τῆς θαλάσσης θηρίον dvaBaivov, ἔχον κέρατα δέκα καὶ ing, 98-99. 


a Cf. xvii. 3. 


κεφαλὰς ἑπτά, kal ἐπὶ τῶν κεράτων αὐτοῦ δέκα διαδήματα, Kalb From 


ἐπὶ τὰς κεφαλὰς αὐτοῦ 


τὸ στόμα αὐτοῦ ὡς στόμα λέοντος. 


A , > “ A A ’ > lol Ἁ > , 
τὴν δύναμιν αὐτοῦ καὶ τὸν θρόνον αὐτοῦ καὶ ἐξουσίαν μεγάλην. 


3. καὶ μίαν ἐκ τῶν κεφαλῶν αὐτοῦ ὡς ἐσφαγμένην εἰς θάνατον - 


cf. Win. § 5, 31, Helbing, 21-22. 


"ὀνόματα βλασφημίας. 
"ὃ εἶδον ἦν " ὅμοιον “ παρδάλει, καὶ οἱ πόδες αὐτοῦ ὡς 


“καὶ ἔδωκεν αὐτῷ ὁ δράκων 


e Dan. vii. 6, cf. Matt. iii. 8, 9, εἴς. 


athena! ; Dan. vii. 

2. καὶ TO θηρίον 4-6. 

aber « c Hereonly, 
ἄρκου, KGL NT.: cf. 
Ign. Rom. 
ν. λεοπαρ- 
δοις, ὃ 
ἐστιν 
στρατιω- 
τικὸν 
τάγμα. 

d On form, 


f xvii. 7-8. Sc. eldov. 


1 For ἐεσταθην (PQ, Me.,S., etc., And., Areth. so Ti., Al.,S. Davidson, Ew., Ramsay, 
Briggs, Gunkel, J. Weiss, Bs., Bj., etc.), Lach., Tr., Diist., Hofm., WH, Ws. (p. 5), 
Sw., Holtz., Hirscht, read eorady (SQAC, 87, 92, vg., Arm., Aeth., Spec., Haym., 


Tic.), as if the dragon awaited the rise of the beast. 


“in the context. 


But of this there is no hint 


A new start is made here, and what follows is (unlike xii.) a per- 
senal vision of the seer who is now dealing with present-day actualities. 


The 


vatiant seems due to an erroneous attempt to deepen the continuity of the two 
-oracles (which is expressed in xii. 17a and xiii. 2c). 


pectation of Nero’s return from the under 
~world and the enforcement of the Imperial 
cultus. For the hypothesis of a Caligula- 
‘source in this chapter, cf. Introd § 6. 

xii. 18-xiii. 18: the saga of the woman 
and the red dragon (a war in heaven) is 
followed by the saga of the two monsters 
from sea and land (a war on earth), who, 
with the dragon, form a triumvirate of 
evil. First (xii. 18-xiii. 10) the monster 
from the sea, #.e., the Roman Empire. 

Ver. 18. The scene is the sea-shore, 
ex hypothest, of the Mediterranean 
{Phedo, tog ὃ, III a, etc.), z.e., the 
West, the whole passage being modelled 
on Dan. vii. 2, 3, 7, 8, 19-27, where the 
stormy sea from which the monsters 
emerge is the world of nations (cf. 4 Esd. 
xi. I: ecce ascendebat de mari aquila, 
-also xiii. 1). 

CuapTER XIII].—Ver. 1. His ten 
horns first become visible. The prophet 
has shifted the diadems from the heads 
‘to the horns (thereby altering their num- 
ber, of necessity), since he wishes to 
stamp the heads (i.e., the Roman em- 
perors, cf. Sib. Or. iii. 176; Tac. Ann. 
xv. 47) with the blasphemous names. 
Hence the ten horns (successive mon- 
archs in the Danielic oracle) are super- 
fluous here, except as δὴ archaic, 
‘pictorial detail in the sketch of this 
polycephalous brute. Such grotesque, 
composite monsters were familiar figures 
an Persian and Babylonian mythology. 
The blasphemous title of divus, assumed 
‘by the emperors since Octavian (Augus- 
tus = σεβαστός) as a semi-sacred title, 


implied superhuman claims which 
shocked the pious feelings of Jews and 
Christians alike. So did θεός and θεοῦ 
υἱός which, as the inscriptions prove, 
were freely applied to the emperors, from 
Augustus onwards. Theimperial system, 
especially with its demand for imperial 
worship, appeared the embodiment of ir- 
reverence and profane infatuation (ver. 6). 
This calm usurpation of divine honours 
was inexplicable except on the supposi- 
tion (ver. 2) that the empire was a tool or 
agent of the devil himself. Much had 
happened since Paul wrote Rom. xiii. 1- 
6, and even since Asiatic Christians had 
received the counsel of 1 Peter ii. 13 f. 

Ver. 2. The empire gathered up all the 
obnoxious qualities of Israel’s former 
oppressors: craft, lust of blood, and 
vicious energy. Hence the combination 
of traits from Daniel’s four beasts: gene- 
ral appearance that of a fierce panther, 
feet like a bear’s (z.e., plantigrade), jaws 
like a lion’s (of devouring strength)—a 
Palestinian (Hos. xiii. 7, 8) picture of a 
perfect beast of prey, raging and raven- 
ing, before whom the church, like Dry- 
den’s milk-white Hind, ‘‘ was often forced 
to fly, And doom’d to death, though fated 
not to die’”’.—Kal ἔδωκεν x.7.A., connect- 
ing the empire with the dragon of xii. 
and stamping it as Satanic (cf. Lueken, 
22 f.; Weinel, 11-12), as a weird and wild 
messiah of the devil on earth. 

Ver. 3. The prophet sees in the em- 
pire an extraordinary vitality which adds 
to its fascination. Disasters which would 
suffice to ruin an ordinary state, leave 


430 


gic, the tat ἡ πληγὴ τοῦ θανάτου 
person 4 
denoted ὅλη ἡ γῆ " ὀπίσω τοῦ θηρίου. 
by μίαν ΟΥ , 


ATIOKAAY¥VIZ ITQANNOY 


XIII. 


fadtod ἐθεραπεύθη, καὶ ὃ" ἐθαυμάσθη. 
x ΄ ῥα 
4. καὶ προσεκύνησαν ᾿ τῷ δράκοντι 


Pa) S ἐξ , ral 6 ea: | Ν , a 6 iw 
the beast.OTL €OWKEV THY εζουσιαν τῳ HPL®, και προσεκύνησαν τῳ np τῶ 


h xvii. 8; 
pregn. 
constr. 
“went 
after him 
in won- 
der”. Cf. 
Acts viii. 
g-11. An- 
tithesis 


λέγοντες, 


δύο: 


from this 


verse, προσκ. in Apoc. takes the dative only with God or angels (xix. 10). 
1Cf. En. v. 4, xcviii. 7-8, ci. 3, cii. 6, 4 Esd. xi. 43, Ps. xil. 4. 


11, Jud. vi. 2, Ps. cxiii. 5, etc. 


͵ 


“τίς "ὅμοιος τῷ θηρίῳ ; 
“cc ‘ , , a 3 > a 9 
καὶ Tis δύναται πολεμῆσαι μετ᾽ αὐτοῦ ; 
5. καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῷ στόμα ᾿ἱ λαλοῦν μεγάλα καὶ βλάσφημα -2 


καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῷ ἐξουσία "᾿ ποιῆσαι μῆνας " τεσσαράκοντα. 


6. καὶ ἤνοιξε τὸ στόμα αὐτοῦ εἰς βλασφημίας πρὸς τὸν θεόν, 


k xviii. 18, Exod. xv. 


τῇ From Dane viii. 12, 24, xi. 28, 30, 32: pregn. Heb. use =‘ exercise” or “‘ practise” (intrans.), with: 


ἐξ. not μῆνας (Jas. iv. 13). Ὦ xi. 2. 


1 For to θηριον (A 79, Anda, Ws., WH marg., Bs.) read tw θηριω (SYCPQ, etc., 


Ande, Areth., edd.). 
θηριον, see ver. 8, 12, xiv. 9, II, xx. 4.] 


* Read βλασφημα A, 12, 28, 34, 35, 47, 


[The acc. is conformed to general usage of προσκ. with 


79, 87, And., etc. (Lach. Al. Ws.): the 


idiomatic ποιησαι has been early improved by the addition of o θελει (δ 8) or πολε-- 
pov (Q, Andc, Areth.), and Naber conj. onpeta ποιησαι. 


Rome as strong as ever, thanks to her 
marvellous recuperative power. The al- 
lusion is not to the murder of Czsar (so 
e.g., Bruston, Gunkel, Porter), nor to 
the illness of Caligula (Spitta), but (so 
Diisterdieck, O. Holtzmann, B. Weiss, 
etc.) to the terrible convulsions which in 
69 A.D. shook the empire to its founda- 
tions (Tac. Hist. i. 11). Nero’s death, 
with the bloody interregnum after it, was 
a wound to the State, from which it only 
recovered under Vespasian. It fulfilled 
the tradition of the wounded head (Dan. 
viii. 8). So 4 Esd. xii. 18 (where the 
same crisis [15 noted) ‘“‘ post tempus regni 
illius [¢.e., Nero’s] nascentur contentiones 
non modicae et periclitabitur ut cadat et 
non cadet tunc, sed iterum constituetur 
in suum initium”; also Suet. Vesp. τ 
and Joseph. Bell. iv. 11, 5, vii. 4,2 (Rome 
unexpectedly rescued from ruin by Ves- 
pasian’s accession). The vitality of the 
pagan empire, shown in this power of 
righting itself after the revolution, only 
added to its prestige. The infatuation 
of loyalty, expressing itself in the worship 
of the emperor as the personal embodi- 
ment of the empire, grew worse and 
worse. A comparison of 3 a with 12 (cf. 
18) shows, however, a further allusion, 
viz., to the Nero redivivus belief (cf. 
Introd. § 5). This is not developed 
until xvii., but already the beast is evi- 
dently identified in a sense with one of 
its heads, who is a travesty (3 a =v. 6) 
of the Lamb, i.e., an antichrist. The 
context would certainly read quite natur- 


ally without 3 a, but it is implied in 12 
(and 18), and none of the numerous at- 
tempts to analyse the chapter into source 
and revision is of any weight, in view of 
the general style and characteristics. 
These indicate the author’s own hand. 
Even the translation-hypothesis (e.g., 
Bruston, Gunkel) leads to arbitrary hand- 
ling. See Introd. § 6. 

Ver. 4. All that had transpired— 
Nero’s own death heralding a return, 
and the collapse of his dynasty proving 
no fatal blow to the empire—had simply 
aggrandised the influence of Rome. ‘Ihe 
Caesar-cult which characterised it is 
dubbed a worship of Satan by the in- 
dignant prophet. The hymn to the in- 
comparable and invincible beast is a 
parody of O.T. hymns to God. In the 
following description (vv. 5-8) two traits 
are blended: insolent blasphemy towards 
God and almost irresistible powers of 
seduction over men. Both are adapted 
from the classical sketch of Antiochus 
Epiphanes (in Dan. vii. 8, 20, 25, xii. 7), 
the prototype of that anti-divine force 
whose climax had been reached, as the 
prophet believed, in the divine preten- 
sions of the Caesars. 

Ver. 5. “Big and blasphemous (or 
abusive; 2 Peter ii. rr) words.”  So- 
Apoc. Bar. lxvii. 7: “surget rex Baby- 
lonis qui destruxit nunc Sionem et gloria- 
bitur super populo et loquetur magna in 
corde suo coram Altissimo”’. 

Ver. 6. The days of Antiochus (Dan. 
viii. To-12) havereturned. On the claims. 


4-9. ATIOKAAY¥IZ IQANNOY 43 
βλασφημῆσαι τὸ ὄνομα αὐτοῦ Kal τὴν σκηνὴν αὐτοῦ [τοὺς ἐν ο C/. John 
X1X. 10-11, 
τῷ οὐρανῷ σκηνοῦντας ]. and below 
ma δ on XVI. 
7. καὶ " ἐδόθη αὐτῷ " ποιῆσαι πόλεμον μετὰ τῶν ἁγίων Kal 17. 
Ξ ᾿ pxi.7. Ful- 
νικῆσαι αὐτούς - filment of 
αὶ π᾿ ef Dan. vii. 
καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῷ “ ἐξουσία ἐπὶ πᾶσαν φυλὴν καὶ γλῶσσαν καὶ 2. 
ΠΣ 1 q Dan. v. 
ἔθνος. 19, Vii. 23. 
8 . ’ r.3 ε a » 6 a 8 Constr. ad 
. καὶ προσκυνήσουσιν ᾿ αὐτὸν πάντες οἱ κατοικοῦντες ἐπὶ τῆς sensum, 
a ‘the 
ys; beast, or 
a a - a -~_ his Im- 
"οὗ of " γέγραπται τὸ ὄνομα αὐτοῦ ἐν τῷ βιβλίῳ τῆς ζωῆς [τοῦ perial re- 
ἀρνίου τοῦ ἐσφαγμένου] ἀπὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου. ag al 
> 2 tem.” Cf. 
9. “el τις ἔχει οὖς, ἀκουσάτω. ee 
to Nero 
Beat! Καὶ Ε Υ Ἐ 4 _ (DioCass. 
lxiii.): ‘‘I come to worship thee, my God, as Mithras s Referring to each individual of 


πάντες. 


t Dan. xii. 1; cf. Ep. Jer. 6, Addit. Esth. xiii. 14, xiv. 3-10. 


Ὁ li. 7, etc. 


1The omission of 7a in ACP, 1, 12, 14, 92, Arm. (zoh.), Iren., Andp, Andbav (so 


Spitta) is due to homoioteleuton. 


of the emperor, see Introd. 86, and Sib. 
Or. v. 33, 34 (Nero ἰσάζων θεῷ αὐτόν), 
Asc. Isa. iv. 6-8, x. 13, etc.—Tots ... 
σκηνοῦντας, an exegetic gloss defining 
σκήνη (cf. xii. 7, 12). The temple in 
Jerusalem is no longer the scene and 
object of the beast’s blasphemy. 

Ver. 7. In Enoch xlvi. 7 the rulers 


κι K. goes with γέγραπται, not ἐσφαγμέ- 
γον. 

Ver. 9. The prophet’s nota bene 
introduces (ver. 10) what is either (a) a 
demand for patience and non-resistance, 
or (δ) an encouragement to it. (a) ‘Be 
patient. If captivity is your destiny from 
God, accept it. If any one is (destined) 


and kings ‘‘make themselves masters of for captivity, to captivity he goes (in 


the stars of heaven [.e., the righteous], 
and raise their hands against the Most 
High”. The beast’s world-wide autho- 
rity goes back to the dragon’s commission 
(2) but ultimately to divine permission 
(soin 5). There is a providence higher 
even than the beast. 

Ver. 8. Standing on the verge of this 
crisis (note the change to the future 
tense), the prophet anticipates the almost 
universal success of the Czsar-cult (cf, iii. 
10). Only the elect will be able to resist 
its appeal (ef. Matt. xxiv. 25). As in the 
O.T., the consciousness of predestination 
is made a moral lever (cf. xvii. 8). The 
rest of mankind who succumb to the cult 
are plainly not on the celestial burgess- 
roll or register. Cf. the instructive 
second-century gloss on Acts v. 39. As 
a rule the faithless in life are deceived (2 
Th. 11. 2-10; Asc. Isa. iv. 7, 8), but here 
the Imperial cultus occupies the place of 
the false prophet in Mark xiii. 12, etc,— 
τοῦ a. τοῦ ἐσφαγμένου, which transfers 
to Christ the possession of the divine 
register of citizens in the heavenly state, 
is usually taken as a scribe’s gloss (after 
xxi. 27 where the position of apviov is 
less difficult). Elsewhere the book of 
life appears by itself. In any case, ἀπὸ 


God’s order, ὑπάγει in a future sense). 
Show your patient faith in God by ab- 
staining from the use of force”’ (cf. Matt. 
xxvi. 52). This interpretation (rejecting 
συνάγει OF ἀπάγει in Io a) is preferable 
to (6) that which reads (or even under- 
stands; with B. Weiss) συνάγει, ἀπάγει, 
or ὑπάγει (SO some cursives and versions) 
in to a, and thus finds in the words a 
promise of requital rather than an appeal 
for endurance. The fate inflicted on 
Christians will recoil on their persecutors 
(cf. xiv. 12). Imprisonment or captivity 
and death were the normal fates of the 
age for criminals who refused to in- 
voke the emperor’s genius (cf. Jos. 
Bell. τ. τὸς τὸς “vis! 8: Τὶ Pade 
de Flacc. τι, leg. ad Gaium, 32). A varia- 
tion of this meaning would be: use force, 
and you (Christians) will suffer for it. 
The whole stanza is written for saints 
who, like Sigurd, are not born for blench- 
ing.— Se «.t.A. Josephus (Bell. iii. 5. 
8, etc.) had just given, from prudential 
motives, a similar warning to Jews 
against participating in any anti-Roman 
movement. It was always hard to dis- 
abuse the Oriental mind of the idea that 
religious faith must be bound up with 
fate and fighting. Cf. Introd. § 6. 


43? 


v Gen.ix.6> το. "el τις εἰς αἰχμαλωσίαν, 
Jer. xv. 2 εἰ ῳ ΕΝ 
(XX). εἰς αἰχμαλωσίαν ὑπάγει - 
w ionian A 
form εἴ τις ἐν “ μαχαίρῃ ἀποκτενεῖ, 
(Win. § 8, SHE aN yh ates 5 Εἰ 
1; οἴ: δεῖ αὐτὸν ἐν ἥ“ μαχαίρῃ ἀποκτανθῆναι " 
Thumb, Shen eye Η͂ \ κε , ne ie tee 
68f.)? ὧδέ ἐστιν ἡ " ὑπομονὴ Kal *4 πίστις τῶν ἁγίων. 
x Cf. ver. , a ἐς Ἂ 
18; Win, 11. Καὶ εἶδον ἄλλο θηρίον ἀναβαῖνον ἐκ τῆς γῆς, καὶ εἶχε κέρατα 
§ 23,1. , 
“Here is δύο "ὅμοια dpviw, καὶ " ἐλάλει ὡς δράκων. 12. καὶ thy ἐξουσίαν 
room ee 3 Pe A αν Aldus: op eee in Α: ἡ ~ ΩΝ 
for.” τοῦ πρώτου θηρίου “ πᾶσαν ποιεῖ “ἧ ἐνώπιον " αὐτοῦ - καὶ * ποιεῖ τὴν 
ySeeoni. Ἅ, Ἄ ᾿ς gg? ΟΥ̓ a ty , δ᾿ Onoi 
g,also γῆν καὶ τοὺς " ἐν αὐτῇ κατοικοῦντας ‘iva προσκυνήσουσι τὸ θηρίον 
Xiv. 2. pa a ΩΝ 
“Etquo τὸ πρῶτον, οὗ ἐθεραπεύθη ἧ πληγὴ τοῦ θανάτου “ αὐτοῦ: 13. 
contemp- a a A ~ A a 
tius abut- καὶ ποιεῖ ἢ σημεῖα μεγάλα ἵνα καὶ ' πῦρ ποιῇ ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ κατα- 
eretur , 3 ᾿ Pe ΣΨ. a , \ k = ᾿ 
patientia βαίνειν εἰς τὴν γῆν ἐνώπιον τῶν ἀνθρώπων. 14. καὶ ἢ πλανᾷ τοὺς 
omi- “- 4." ἢ, a a 1 a aA ws yar A 
num" κατοικοῦντας ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ᾿διὰ τὰ σημεῖα ἃ ἐδόθη αὐτῷ ποιῆσαι 
ate ™ ἐγώπιον τοῦ θηρίου, λέγων τοῖς κατοικοῦσιν ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ποιῆσαι 
z Sec. 
article 


ALIOKAAYYVIZ IQANNOY 


XIII. 


usually omitted. Win. ὃ 18, 7b. For idea, cf. 4 Macc. xvi. 18-23, etc. For form, cf. Class. Rev. 1904, 


108-109, Helbing, 31-32. ‘ ap. i 
passage forms an apocalyptic application, 
§ 20, 11 f. d Ver. 14, xix. 20. 
only. 


as false Elijah. kii. 20, Deut. xiii. 2-4. 


a Chap. ix. 10; from Dan. viii. 3; cf. Matt. vii. 15, of which this 
Ὁ Gen. iii. 15, cf. τ Macc. i. 30. 
e Cf. on iii. 8. 
h xvi. 14, xix. 20, so (Beliar) Sib. Or. iii. 63-74, 2 Thess. ii. 9, Mark xiii. 22, etc. 
En. lxvii. 7. 


c Cf. Win. 
g With ἐν, here 
ixi.5: 
1 Cf. xii. 2 (6ua=dat. instrum.). 


f Cf. iii. 9 (xiii. 15). 


m By his authority, or at his instigation (cf. Num. iii. 6, etc.). 


Vv. 11-18: the Imperial alter ego or 
the second beast, a monster from the 
land (identified afterwards with the tra- 
ditional ‘‘ false prophet,”’ xvi. 13, xix. 20, 
xx. Io). This mythological figure is not 
any individual like Simon Magus or 
Alexander of Abonoteichos or Apollonius 
of Tyana or Balaam redivivus, but a per- 
sonification of some order or institution 
devoted to the interests of the empire on 
its religious side, #.e., the priests of the 
Czsar-cult in the provinces and especi- 
ally (cf. Introd. § 6) in Asia Minor, where 
the local dignitaries acted through the 
Diet of Asia in order to superintend and 
popularise the cult (so Holtzm., Pfleid., 
Charles, Bartlet, Porter, Bousset, Forbes, 
Swete). The following description brings 
out the cunning, suavity, and arrogance 
of this sacerdotal power. 

Ver. 11. ἐκ τῆς y7Hs—the mythological 
trait is applied geographically to Asia 
Minor (i.¢., the East). Here again the 
cosmological antithesis has been trans- 
formed into a political application. The 
marine monster cannot exercise domi- 
nion over the land except through an 
intermediary ἐκ τῆς γῆς. Cf. Apoc. Bar. 
xxix. 4, where the two beasts, leviathan 
and behemoth, rise from the sea and the 
land, as in the ancient Semitic and Baby- 
lonian mythology the dry land and the 
deep were the habitations of the two 


primeval monsters (En. Ix. 7 f., 4 Esd. vi. 
49 f.), who represented the chaos-oppo- 
nent of heaven. The mild appearance of 
the beast (6p. apy. does not mean that 
he deceived men with the name of the 
Lamb) is accompanied by a plausible 
appeal (cf. Weinel, 21 f.). The allusion 
(ver. 12), borrowed from the older dragon- 
myth, is to the seductive inducements held 
out by the Beast to Christians, such as 
considerations of loyalty, patriotism, self- 
interest, and the like. These are backed 
by (ver. 13) miracles, which together with 
magic are also connected with Nero redi- 
vivus in Asc. Isa. iv. 9-11 (cf. A. C. 175 
f.). The deceptive influence of miracles 
was a sure sign of the end, in early Chris- 
tian literature (cf. the lines of the πρεσ- 
Burns cited by Irenzus, i. 15, 6). Most 
Oriental cults practised such tricks la- 
vishly, and constant warnings against 
them were heard (cf. Weinel 9; Fried- 
lander, iii. 458 f., 521 f.). 

Ver. 14. As Beliar sets up “his image 
before him in every city” (Asc. Isa. iv. 
II, after r1o=‘‘and there will be the 
power of his miracles in every city and 
region’’), so here the εἰκών or bust of 
the emperor as the Neronic antichrist 
representing the empire (cf. the hint 
repeated from ver. 12 c) is brought for- 
ward along with the statues of the gods 
to receive offerings of wine and incense 


so—18. 


ANOKAAYY¥IZ, TQANNOY 


433 


εἰκόνα TO θηρίῳ "ὃς ἔχει τὴν πληγὴν τῆς paxalpys καὶ ἔζησε. 15.0 0}. om 


αὐτόν (8). 


‘ ld > ~ -“- lol ~ > / A , - . 
καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῷ δοῦναι πνεῦμα τῇ εἰκόνι τοῦ θηρίου, iva καὶ ο Acts xvi. 


16. 


ολαλήσῃ ἡ εἰκὼν τοῦ θηρίου, καὶ ἢ ποιήσει ' iva “ ὅσοι ἂν μὴ Mpoo-pC/. ver. τ2. 


, A eee 2 “~ 6 , P2 θῶ 
κυνήσωσι τὴν εἰκόνα τοῦ θηρίου ” ἀποκτανθῶσι. 
πάντας, τοὺς μικροὺς καὶ τοὺς μεγάλους, καὶ τοὺς πλουσίους καὶ 
τοὺς πτωχούς, καὶ τοὺς ἐλευθέρους καὶ τοὺς δούλους, Piva ᾿ δῶσιν 


αὐτοῖς "χάραγμα ἐπὶ τῆς "Ὧ᾿ χειρὸς 


τὸ “ μέτωπον αὐτῶν, 17. [καὶ] "ἵνα μή τις δύνηται 2 “ ἀγοράσαι ἢ 
a > 4. « > x , a a” 6 Η Χ Ν 
πωλῆσαι, εἰ μὴ 6 ἔχων τὸ χάραγμα, τὸ ὄνομα τοῦ θηρίου, " ἢ τὸν 


ἀριθμὸν τοῦ ὀνόματος αὐτοῦ. 


322). q Dan. iii. 5-7, 15. 


Xvi. 2, xix. 18-20 (vii. 3, ix. 4), of. Ps. Sol. xv. 30. 


Ant. iii. 7.6. Orneck? Ps. Sol. ii. 6. 
w 1 Mace. xiii. 49. 
quality; cf. v. 12, vii. 12. 


18. "ὧδε ἡ "copia ἐστίν. 


τ Indef. plur. as x. 11, xvi. 15 (-- " they get”). 


Double 
use of 

ποιεῖν, 
the ἵνα 


16. καὶ ποιεῖ 


+++ ποιῇ 
(epexeg. 
Of μεγάλα) 
of ver. 13 
(with πῦρ 
displaced 
for em- 
phasis) = 
ὥστε 
ποιεῖν Of 
result 
(Burton, 
8 Xiv. 9-II, 
u Cf. Jos. 


- er “ t A na Te 
αὐτῶν τῆς ‘Seftas, ἢ ἐπὶ 


ες »” 
ὃ ἔχων 


t Cf. Assuan Papyri (K, 4.6). 


v = Infin. epexeg. 1 John v. 20, etc. Burton, 198, 213. 
x xvii. 9, cf. 4 Esd. vi. 10 ¢ijre1,"E¢pe. 


y only here in Apoc., of human 


1 ποιήσει SQ (min.), Syr., Tr. marg., WH marg., Ws.: for τὴν evxova (A, min., 
Lach. Al. Bs.) Ti., Tr.. WH, Ws., Bj., Sw. read ty εἰκονι (ΡΟ, etc., Hipp., 


Areth.). 
displaced by avtyn (avtw). 


Little is to be said for WH’s conj. that rn yy has been either lost after or 


2 Lach., Ti., Bj. om., Al. WH, Bs.. Sw. bracket, the και of S§cAPQ, etc., vg., Arm., 
Aeth., Areth., Haym.: the irreg. δυναται is read by PQ, min. (Ws., WH marg., Bs.). 


from the citizens. For the naive identi- 
fication of such images with the deities 
they represented see Friedlander, iii. 
500 f.—A€ywv= κελεύων (Blass ὃ 72, 5). 

Ver. 15. The statue is made to speak, 
in order to work on the credulity and 
awe of the worshippers. The trick was 
well within the reach of contemporary 
magic (cf. Valer. Maxim. i. 8. 3-5), and 
later tradition attributed it to Simon 
Magus (Clem. Recogn. iii. 47, cf. Clem. 
Hom. ii. 32), while similar ventriloquism 
was practised by Apollonius of Tyana and 
Egyptian sorcerers at Caligula’s court. 
Cf. Lucian’s αὐτόφωνοι χρησμοὶ (Alex. 
26).---ἀποκτανθῶσιν, cf. the scutcheon of 
Captain Pope in Bunyan’s Holy War— 
‘“‘ the stake, the flame, and the good man 
invit.”. 

Vv. 16, 17. Detection was inevitable, 
for the very coins were stamped (Matt. 
xxii. 10) with the head of the Czsar, the 
gods, or Rome itself, and the prophet 
apparently expected that genuine Chris- 
tians would refuse to sanction idolatry 
and condone blasphemy by handling 
such emblems of profanity {τ Ign. ad 
Magn. 5, δύο νομίσματα, ὃ μὲν θεοῦ, ὃ δὲ 
κόσμου). Only abject, servile devotees of 
the cultus will stoop to that! Irenzus 
has a similar allusion (iv. 30. 2) to those 
who carried money ‘cum inscriptione 
et imagine Cesaris”.—pérwrov. This 
highly figurative allusion is to the habit 
of marking soldiers and slaves with a 


conspicuous tattoo or brand (cf. Lucian, 
Dea Syra; 3 Macc. ii. 29, where the 
Alexandrian Jews are branded with the 
mark of Dionysius; also on Gal. vi. 17) ; 
or, better still, to the religious cus- 
tom of wearing a god’s name as a 
talisman (cf. Deissmann, 349 f.). The 
general sense of the prediction is that 
the faithful will be shut up to the 
alternative of starving or of coming for- 
ward to avow their prohibited faith, so 
subtly and diabolically does the cultus of 
the emperor pervade all social life. An- 
other solution is to think of the χάραγμα 
or red stamp, which was essential to all 
documents of exchange (Deissmann, 
240 f.); it consisted of a red seal with 
tho emperor’s name or effigy. Ramsay 
(Seven Letters, pp. 106 f.) takes the 
whole description as a symbolic and 
rather sarcastic way of referring to a 
boycotting demand that every Asiatic 
Christian should somehow “stamp him- 
self overtly and visibly as loyal, or be 
disqualified from participation in ordinary 
social life and trading”. Probably the 
passage is a figurative and unqualified 
expression for conspicuous loyalty to the 
Imperial cult. In Ep. Lugd. the devil is 
said to work against Christ by ‘“ excluding 
us from houses, baths, and markets, and 
also by forbidding any one of us to ap- 
pear anywhere”. 

Ver. 18. ‘‘Now for wisdom ’’—skill to 
penetrate the secret of the cryptogram 


434 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


XIII. 


νοῦν ψηφισάτω τὸν ἀριθμὸν τοῦ θηρίου - ἀριθμὸς γὰρ ἀνθρώπου ἐστί, 


κ 
και oO 


ἀριθμὸς αὐτοῦ ἑξακόσιοι + ἑξήκοντα ἕξ. 


1 χξζ΄, 1.6., εξακοσιοι (-at) εξηκοντα ε (NAPA, etc., Iren., Vict., Pr.), but xub’, 7.2, 
ξξακοσιοι Sexa εξ (C, 5, 11, Tic., Spec., “quidam sequentes idiotismum’”’ apud 


Tren.). 


See on xiv. 20, and Zahn, § 75, n. 5. 


‘“‘There is no doubt but that 616 


given in the Jerusalem codex is the original Armenian reading ’’ (Conybeare). 


which would reveal the features of the 
dread opponent. This cryptic method 
was a favourite apocalyptic device, due 
partly to prudential reasons, partly to the 
desire for impressiveness ; Orientals loved 
symbolic and enigmatic modes of ex- 
pression in religion (cf. Apoc. Bar. xxviii. 
I, 2; Sib. Or. i. 141 f.; Barn. ix. 8, bur- 
lesqued by Lucian in Alex. 11). The 
prophet here drops the réle of seer for 
that of hierophant or cabbalist. He in- 
vites his readers to count the name or 
number of the Beast, i.e., to calculate a 
name whose letters, numerically valued 
on the fanciful principles of Gematria, 
would amount to 666. For John and 
his readers the Beast was primarily the 
foreign power which opposed the divine 
kingdom, i.e., in this case, the Roman 
empire. But the drift of the present 
oracle is the further identification of the 
empire with the emperor, or rather 
(ver. 3) with one emperor in particular. 
Hence the prophet throws out the hint 
which will solve his riddle: the number 
of τοῦ θηρίου is ἀριθμὸς ἀνθρώπου, 
i.e., of a historic personality. ᾿Ανθρώπου 
does not require τινός or ἑνός before it 
to bring this out. The only intelligible 
sense of the words is ‘‘a human num- 
ber,’’ z.e., not a number which is intelli- 
gible (for no other kind of number would 
be worth mentioning) but one which 
answered to an individual. Hence it isa 
matter of comparative indifference what 
the number of the Beast originally meant 
—TEITAN (so recently Abbott 80 f= 
Titus, Teitous), H AATEINH (ITAAH) 


_BACILEIA (Clemen), AATEINOC, Ὁ 
JO (=616), DWNT DY (-- 666), 
Nimrod (ὩΣ) 9) 79, Bruston), or 


any other (cf. Cheyne’s Traditions and 
Beliefs of Anc. Israel, p. 248). This 
generic number is expressly identified or 
equalised by John with the number of an 


individual, viz., Nero Cesar (ἢ ἽΌΡ)» 
the Greek letters of which yield 666. 
The defective writing of Op (without 


the yod) is not unexampled. Besides, the 
abbreviated form would gain, at a very 
slight expense, this telling and symet- 


trical cipher. Furthermore, when the 
last letter of Neron is dropped, this Latin- 
ised spelling brings the total value of 
the name to 616, the very variant which 
puzzled Irenzeus. Gunkel’s proposal 


mya OWN (primal chaos=Tia- 
mat) suffers from several flaws; it omits 
the article, it employs a feminine ending 
which is not used in adjectives of this 
type, and “ primal” is not a conventional 
epithet of mystery (cf. G. F. Moore in 
Fourn. Amer. Oriental Society, 1906, 
315 f.). Besides, as Gunkel admits, there 
are no Babylonian parallels to xiii. 11-17. 
Thus, while the application of the term 
is obvious, its origin is obscure. The 
basis of such contrivances (which became 
popular in Gnostic circles) was twofold: 
(a) gematria, which, using Greek and 
Hebrew letters to denote numbers, could 
often turn a name into a suggestive 
cipher; (δ) isopsephia, which put two 
words together of the same numerical 
value (cf. for instances of ἰσόψηφα, 
Farrar 468 f. and Corssen). Probably 
the number of the Beast belonged to 
tradition. John plays upon it in order 
to disclose the shuddering climax of his 
oracle, that the final foe of the saints 
was Nero redivivus. The particular 
number 666 was specially apt as a sym- 
bol for this anti-divine power, since it 
formed a vain parody of the sacred num- 
ber seven (Gfrérer motes further the 
ominous usage of 13=6+6+6 in Judges 
iii. 14, x. 8; Jerem. xxxii. 1, lii. 29; Luke 
xiii. I, etc.), always falling short of it. 
In Sib. Or. i. 324 f. 888 represents Christ, 
and Origen (on E-ek. iy. 9) remarks, 
apropos of the present passage, ἐστὶν ὃ 
ἀριθμὸς οὗτος πάθους σύμβολον καὶ κακ- 
ὥώσεως τοῦ σωτῆρος τῇ ἕκτῃ ἡμέρᾳ πεπον- 
θότος. Irenzeus explains the suitability 
of the number as “in recapitulationem 
uniuersae apostasiae eius, quae facta est 
in sex millibus annorum” (adv. Haer. v. 
28, 2). Thus the very number 666 by it- 
self, may have been significant of the 
anti-divine power. The Neronic applica- 
tion would intensify and concentrate its 
meaning for John’s readers who were 
initiated. And such calculations, as the 
Pompeii graffiti prove, were familiar even 


“XIV. 1—3. 


AITOKAAYY¥IZ IQANNOY 


435 


XIV. τ. Kai εἶδον, καὶ ἰδοὺ τὸ " ἀρνίον " ἑστὸς ἐπὶ τὸ ὄρος Σιών, ἃ ν. 6. 


be 


Ὁ vii. 4; οἵ. 


4 > > A Ν μ᾿ Ν ᾿ 
καὶ μετ΄ αὐτοῦ " ἑκατὸν τεσσεράκοντα τέσσαρες χιλιάδες ἔχουσαι τὸ Zech. xiv. 


» a a ~ a 3: 
ὄνομα αὐτοῦ καὶ τὸ ὄνομα τοῦ πατρὸς αὐτοῦ “ γεγραμμένον ἐπὶ τῶν c iii. 12, 


a 


μετώπων αὐτῶν. 2. 


ὑδάτων πολλῶν καὶ ὡς φωνὴν βροντῆς μεγάλης - καὶ ἧ φωνὴ ἣν 
ἤκουσα ὡς “κιθαρῳδῶν κιθαριζόντων ἐν ταῖς κιθάραις αὐτῶν. 5. 


‘to Greek-speaking inhabitants of the em- 
pire. The Pergamos-inscriptions furnish 
analogous instances. 

CHAPTER XIV. The prophet again 
breaks off to point his readers across the 
sombre vista opened up by this oracle of 
the θηρίον, not to the church as an oasis 
and asylum on earth but to the glad sure 
hope of the faithful after death. Howcan 
the θηρίον be met ? Who (ver. 8) can hold 
out against such seductions? By way of 
answer to such doubts and fears the pro- 
phet raises the veil of the future for a 
moment to reveal the heavenly (cf. xiii. 
15, xiv. 3) survivors of the conflict (xiv. 
1-5); whereupon he rapidly sketches the 
doom of Rome and the pagan world by 
way of contrast (6-20). The latter pas- 
sage, in its present form and site, gives a 
proleptic outline of catastrophes described 
later on (cf. xiv. 7=xix. 1-6, xiv. 8=xviii. 
2, 3, etc.). The two supreme motives for 
patient loyalty on the part of the saints 
{ver. 12) are, (a) negatively, fear of the 
fate reserved for the unbelieving (xiv.8- 
11), and, (b) positively, the bliss in store 
for the loyal (ver. 13, cf. 1-5). 

Vv. 1-5, introduced as a foil to what 
precedes and as an anticipation of xxi.- 
xxil., is ‘‘a sort of Te Deum” (Well- 
hausen), a vision of the Lamb no longer 
as sldin but triumphant (militant on the 
mount of Olives, Zech. xiv. 3 f., against 
the nations=Apoc. xi. 8, 18), attended 
by the élite of the redeemed who had 
worshipped him, not the Emperor, dur- 
ing their life-time. The Jewish tradition 
underlying this oracle seems to have 
been cognate to that of En. i. 4 f. (Greek), 
teflected already in vii. 1-8; it showed the 
rallying of the faithful remnant at mount 
Zion (Joel ii. 32; Isa. xi. 9-12) after the 
throes of the latter days (cf. on xi. 19). 
In terms of this John pictures the Chris- 
tians who appear with Jesus their mes- 
siah upon earth (cf. v. 10, xx. 4-6). 
Verses 1-5 thus hint faintly and frag- 
mentarily at the belief that, before the 
general judgment and recompense of the 
Saints (xi. 18, xx. 11 f.), the vanguard 
who had borne the brunt of the struggle 
would enjoy a special bliss of their own. 


\ » a > “ 5 ~ ε 4 
καὶ ἤκουσα φωνὴν ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ ὡς φωνὴν 


Ezek. ix. 
4. 
αἴ, x15, xix: 
I, 6. 
© am. dey. 
NT. xviii. 
22. 
The prophet does not stop to elaborate 
this independent anticipation of xx. 4-6, 
but hurries on (6 f.) to depict the negative 
side, viz., the downtall of the enemy. 
When Caligula first attempted to enforce 
his worship on the Jews, the pious flung 
themselves on the ground, “ stretching 
out their throats” in their readiness to 
die sooner than let their God be profaned 
(Jos; Bell; iv τὸ; 4; Ant. xviii. 8, 3). 
John desiderates an equally dauntless 
temper in Christians, though they could 
not hope to avert, as the Jews had done, 
the imperial propaganda of the false pro- 
phet (xiii. 16 f.; cf. 2 Thess. ii.). Martyr- 
dom (xiv. 13, ¢f. xiii. 15) was all that 
the majority could expect. But loyalty 
would bring them ultimate triumph. 
The passage is not simply Christian but 
from the hand of the prophet himself. 
Ver. 1. Instead of the beast, the 
Lamb; instead of the beast’s followers 
and their mark, the Lamb’s followers 
with the divine name; instead of the 
pagan earth, mount Zion. The vision 
is based on an old Jewish apocalyptic 
tradition, copied by the Christian editor 
of 4 Esdras (ii. 42) but already present in 
the Jewish original (xiii. 35: ipse [#.e., 
Messias] stabit super cacumen montis 
Sion, 39 et quoniam uidisti eum colligen- 
tem ad se aliam multitudinem pacificam, 
hae sunt decem tribus), which apparently 
described (cf. Joel ii. 32) a further cycle 
of the tradition underlying vii. 1-8. The 
appearance of this manlike messiah on 
mount Zion was accompanied by the 
manifestation of the celestial Zion (post- 
poned here till xxi.). Thus, xiv. 1-5 is, in 
some respects, a companion panel to vii. 
9 ἢ, though the retinue of messiah are 
painted in more definitely Jewish colours. 
They are distinguished for their testimony 
borne against the Imperial cultus and 
the contaminations of the pagan world. 
Ver. 3. Who sing the new song? 
angels or the redeemed? In v. 9 it is 
chanted not before the living creatures and 
elders but by them; here it is not origin- 
ally sung by the redeemed (as in xv. 3 
and 4 Esd. ii. 42) but is intelligible to 
them and to them alone. Their experi- 


436 


f i.e., the 
angels. 


. , , Ν lol , 
gjud. xvi. τεσσάρων ζῴων καὶ τῶν πρεσβυτέρων 


ΑΠΟΚΛΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


ΧΙν.. 


3Ξ, A -- 
καὶ ‘a8ovow " ὠδὴν Σ καινὴν ἐνώπιον τοῦ θρόνου καὶ ἐνώπιον TOY 


Ἐ καὶ οὐδεὶς ἐδύνατο μαθεῖν. 


13. 
hcf.ii17, τὴν ὡδὴν εἰ μὴ αἱ ἑκατὸν τεσσεράκοντα τέσσαρες χιλιάδες, ᾿ οἱ 


πὸ Sen ᾿ dae 2 
iconstr.ad Nyopacwevor ἀπὸ τῆς γῆς. 
sensum 
(as v. 13, 

Xi. 4, etc.) 
k Triple 
οὗτοι an 
apoc. 
formula 
(cf. Jude 
12, etc.). 
lcf. Just. 
A pol.i. 15, 
Matt. xix. 
12, Eus. 
ΗΕ: τ: 


γάρ εἶσιν. 


τῷ ἀρνίῳ]. 


24 (Melito τὸν εὐνοῦχον), 2 Clem. xii. 2, C.I.G. 3098 (παρθένοι ἱερατείας, in ethnic sense). 


4. " οὗτοί εἰσιν ot μετὰ γυναικῶν οὐκ ἐμολύνθησαν - 


παρθένοι 


* οὗτοι of ™ ἀκολουθοῦντες τῷ ἀρνίῳ ὅπου ἄν " ὑπάγει. 
A a “- Ν 
« οὗτοι “ ἠγοράσθησαν ἀπὸ τῶν ἀνθρώπων Ῥ ἀπαρχὴ τῷ θεῷ [καὶ 


Ν ᾳ 3 “ Ι ας 9 [ΠΥ ΤΗΣ lol Pa oe , > 
5. καὶ “ ἐν τῷ στόματι αὐτῶν οὐχ “ εὑρέθη ψεῦδος - * ἄμωμοί εἰσιν. 


m Matt. 


XVi. 24-25, Joh. xxi. 19, 1 Pet. ii. 21-22. Quoted (in Ep. Lugd.) of the martyr Vettius Epagathus. 


nas in Mark vi. 56 (indic.). ο 2 Pet. ii. 1. 
liii. 9, Zeph. iii. 13, Ps. xiv. 1f., xxx. 2. 
(sacrificial). 


p cf. Schol. on Eurip. Orest. 96. 
T Jude 24; cf. Col. i. 22,1 Pet. i. 19, Heb. ix. 14 


q I Pet. ii. 22, Isa. 


1 Ti. (Al.), Ws., Bj. rightly om. ws (with ΣΦ ΡΟ, etc., Me., Pesh., Aeth., Arm., Orig., 
Method., And¢, pal, Areth., Pr.) before ὡδην, as an echo of ver. 2. 


ence enabled them to enter into its mean- 
ing. This privilege is due to (vv. 4-5) 
their previous character and conduct, 
This inner circle are ascetics, παρθένοι. 
i.e., not merely unmarried or free from 
sexual vice but celibates (cf. Cheyne, 
Orig. Psalter, 446; Hoennicke, das 
Fudenchristentum, 1908, 130 f. ; Balden- 
sperger, 109; von Dobschiitz, 39 f., 228, 
261); cf. 1 Cor. vii. 32. The prevailing 
Jewish respect for marriage did not check 
a tendency to celibacy which was by no 
means confined to the Essenes or Thera- 
peutae. Even Methodius, who allegorises 
the seven heads of xii. 3 into the seven 
deadly sins and the stars of xii. 2 into 
heretics, takes this phrase literally, in the 
sense of virginity not simply of purity (so 
Epiph. Her. xxx. 2); and, although the 
touch is too incidental to bear pressing, 
it is unmistakable (cf. Introd. § 6). In 
the popular religion of Phrygia there was 
a feeling (expressed in the eunuchism, 
e.g., of the priests at Hierapolis) that 
one came nearer to the divine life by 
annihilating the distinction of sex, while 
in the votive inscriptions of Asia Minor 
(C. B. P. i. 137) marriage is not recog- 
nised as part of the divine or religious 
life. This atmosphere of local feeling, 
together with the lax moral conscience 
of the popular religion, would foster the 
religious tendency to regard celibates 
as pre-eminently near to God.—akodov- 
θοῦντες : either a historic present to secure 
vividness (ἀκολουθήσαντες, syr. S), in 
which case the allusion is to their earthly 
loyalty (reff.), or, more probably (in view 


of ὑπάγει, pres.),a description of their 
heavenly privilege and position (cf. vii. 
17), borrowed from Egyptian religion 
where the “ followers of Horus,” the divine 
and victorious son of Osiris, were a series 
of celestial kings who were supposed to 
have reigned during the earlier dynasties. 
To be among the “followers of Horus” 
was an equivalent for immortal life. Cf. 
E. B. D. τοι: ‘Let me rise up among 
those who follow the great God; I am the 
son of Maiti, and that which he abomina- 
teth is the spirit of falsehood [cf. Apoc. 
xiv. 5]. 1am in triumph! ”’—aré in 3, 4 15 
equivalent to the partitive ἐκ (cf. v. 9).— 
ἀπαρχή: they form the firstfruits of 
mankind for God; others are to follow, 
but these are the élite, they have a pres- 
tige all their own. The idea of priority 
shades into that of superiority, though in 
a very different way from that of Rom. 
xi. 16. Dr. Rendel Harris (in Present 
Day Papers, May, 1gor) describes the 
interest and excitement at Jerusalem dur- 
ing the early days of summer when “the 
first ripe figs were in the market. When 
one’s soul desires the vintage or the fruit- 
age of the summer. . . the trees that are 
a fortnight to the fore are the talk and 
delight of the town.”—«at 7.4., usually 
taken asa scribe’s gloss. Elsewhere the 
saints are redeemed by, not for, the Lamb: 
ν. 9). 

' Wy. 5. ἅμωμοι, “unblemished” (a 
ritual term), possibly contains a sacrificial 
tinge, like ἀπαρχή in some of the inscrip- 
tions (= gift to deity), cf. Thieme’s Jn- 
schriften von Magnesia, 26. These 


o/s 


ATIOKAAYYVIZ IQANNOY 437 


6. Καὶ εἶδον "ἄλλον! ἄγγελον πετόμενον ἐν * μεσουρανήματι, s here and 
” 13 ᾿ + ιν , are ‘ w , ΟῚ 15, 17f., 
ἔχοντα “ εὐαγγέλιον αἰώνιον “ εὐαγγελίσαι ἐπὶ τοὺς ἡ καθημένους ἐπὶ perhaps 
a“ a A > on ‘ Mi (Ε t ε 
τῆς γῆς "καὶ ἐπὶ πᾶν ἔθνος καὶ φυλὴν καὶ γλῶσσαν καὶ λαόν, idiomatic 
use Of a. 
7. “λέγων ἐν φωνῇ μεγάλῃ, in Plato, 
μὴ = προ- 
“5 φοβήθητε τὸν θεὸν καὶ " δότε αὐτῷ δόξαν, σέτι, Cf. 
ΓῚ ἦλθ ς ῳ ~ , > A use of 
ὅτι ἦλθεν ἡ ὥρα τῆς κρίσεως αὐτοῦ - ἕτερος int 
Dan. viii. 
13, etc. 
t viii. 13. u a genuine gospel (cf, Gal. i. 8). να Pet. i. 25; for contr. John xvi. 12. w Cf 
Luke xxi. 35. X X. I1, ΧΙ, 7, and (for καί epexeg,) xi. 18, xiii. 12. y cf. iv, 1, etc. z xi. 18, 


Fear God, not the beast, cf. Xen. Mem. iv. 19. 


a xi. 13. 


1 αλλον is more likely to have been omitted (so $¥*Q, Orig., etc., Bs.), owing to 


the difficulty of reference (x. 1, xi. 15) than to have been inserted. 


Weiss conj. aetov. 


adherents are redeemed. But in another 
aspect their qualities of purity and guile- 
lessness form a sweet sacrifice to God. 
A Christian not only may be redeemed 
but may sacrifice himself in the interests 
of the Redeemer.—etSos. In view of 
xxi. 8, 27, xxii. 15 it is superfluous to 
think of prophets or teachers specially 
(Weinel, 146-148) in this connexion, al- 
though the gifts of utterance and pro- 
phecy were particularly associated with 
asceticism (En. 1xxxiii., cviii., etc.) in the 
early church of the first century; 6.9.» 
“the whole yoke of the Lord” in Did. 
vi. may refer to celibacy (in which case 
τέλειος would be equivalent to ἄμωμος 
here). Cf. the discussion of reasons, in a 
Babylonian incantation (Zimmern, die 
Beschwirungstafeln Shurpu, 5, 6), why 
the sufferer was punished. ‘‘ Has he 
for ‘no’ said ‘yes’, | For ‘yes’ said‘no’? 

. Was he frank in speaking | but false 
in heart? | Wasit ‘ yes’ with his mouth | 
but ‘no’ in his heart?’’?’ The Assyrian 
idiom for loyalty is ‘‘true speech in the 
mouth of the people,” neither rebellious 
nor seditious talk. 

Vv. 6-20: the fearful doom of the im- 
penitent pagans is announced in a triple 
vision of angels (ver. 6-13), whereupon a 
proleptic summary of the final judgment 
on the world follows (ver. 14-20). In 
6-13, 12-13 and καὶ ἐν τ. a. (10) are the 
only specifically Christian touches; but 
the latter need not even be a scribal 
gloss, and 6-11 is intelligible as the out- 
burst of a vehement Jewish Christian 
apocalyptist. The stylistic data do not 
justify any hypothesis of an edited source. 
The first angel (6-7) announces (evayye- 
Moat here, and perhaps also in x. 7, in 
neutral sense of LXX, 2 Sam. xviii. 19-20; 
Dio Cass. Ixi. 13) to the universe the 
news that the divine purpose is now to 
be consummated, but that there is still 


VOL. V. 


For ayyedov J. 


(cf. xi. 3) a chance to repent (implicit, ef. 
Mark i. 15). The sterner tone of viii. 13- 
ix. 21 is due to the fact that men were: 
there accounted as strictly responsible for: 
their idolatry and immorality. Here the 
nations are regarded in the first instance- 
as having been seduced by Rome into the: 
Imperial cultus (8-9); hence they get a. 
warning and a last opportunity of trans-: 
ferring their allegiance to its rightful ob- 
ject. The near doom of the empire, of 
which the prophet is convinced even in 
the hour of her aggrandisement (xiii. 8), 
is made a motive for urging her beguiled 
adherents to repent in time and her 
Christian victims to endure (xiv. 12). 
The substance of this proclamation is not 
much of a gospel, and the prophet evi- 
dently does not look for much result, if 
any. Its ‘‘pure, natural theism” (Sim- 
cox) is paralleled by that of Rom. ii. 5 f. 
Ver. 6. πετόμενον : angels begin to 

fly in the Jewish heaven about the be- 
ginning of the first century B.c. (En. lxi. 
I). 

ie 7. ποιήσαντι K.T-A. Since he who 
has created has the right to judge his 
creatures, as well as to receive their wor- 
ship (cf. iv. 11 f., etc.).—@pa = the fixed 
(cf. 15), καιρός the fit, moment for action. 
Contrast with this summons Lucan’s 
fulsome appeal to Nero (i. 57 f,): ‘‘lib- 
Tati pondera cceli Orbe tene medio,” 
etc. The second angel of the trio an- 
nounces the faults and fall of (ver. 8) 
Rome asasecond Babylon. The prophet 
quotes from the postexilic oracle ap- 
pended to Jeremiah (Jer. li. 7-8).—@v 

has probably the double sense cane be 
the English term ‘‘ passion”. As history 
proves, the Cesar cult fairly intoxicated 
people, especially in the East. In Asia 
Minor it became a perfect passion with 
many communities. They will find it a 
different kind of passion, the prophet 


28 


438 ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY XIV. 
τ oa A - - 
ype iene καὶ προσκυνήσατε TO ἢ" ποιήσαντι τὸν οὐρανὸν Kal THY γῆν καὶ 
a 12, “ θάλασσαν Kal “ πηγὰς ὑδάτων.᾽᾽ 
Store an 8. kai ἄλλος ἄγγελος δεύτερος } ἠκολούθησε λέγων, 
X. 0, an 
3 39 
ne “Ἔπεσεν “ ἔπεσε " Βαβυλὼν ἡ ‘ μεγάλη: 
5. CxIv1, 
a ee es A A Ξ is 
6, Deut, ξῇ ἐκ Tod οἴνου [τοῦ θυμοῦ] τῆς πορνείας αὐτῆς πεπότικε 
xxii. 3 3 
with Acts πάντα τὰ Ov.” 
iv. 24, xiv, : : r ᾿ 
15. 9. καὶ ἄλλος ἄγγελος τρίτος ἠκολούθησεν αὐτοῖς λέγων ἐν φωνῇ 
ΕΣ κῶν Ὁ Η Ε = 
xvi. 4.'an μεγάλῃ, “Εἴ τις προσκυνεῖ “Td θηρίον καὶ τὴν εἰκόνα αὐτοῦ καὶ 
irreg. rN , , ae δ᾽) a , > πὰ. 5 τὰ ‘ a h 3 a 2 
omission λαμβάνει χάραγμα ἐπὶ ᾿ τοῦ μετώπου αὐτοῦ ἢ ἐπὶ τὴν χεῖρα ” αὐτοῦ, 
of article, k κι 5 ὡς une > im uh Bias in A = a a 
see Win, 10. “καὶ αὐτὸς ᾿πίεται ἐκ TOU οἴνου τοῦ θυμοῦ τοῦ θεοῦ, τοῦ 
§ 18, ἃ, ΄ > , > n ΄ - > a > a ‘ 
jaor. οἱ Κεκερασμένου “dkpdtou ἐν τῷ ποτηρίῳ τῆς ὀργῆς αὐτοῦ, καὶ 


“ , 

ἀρ ρα βασανισθήσεται ἐν πυρὶ καὶ " θείῳ ἐνώπιον ἀγγέλων " ἁγίων 

pened” 

(so xviii. 2), Moult. i. 135; cf. Isa. xxi. 9. eT Pet. v. x3. f Dan. iv. 27 (30), Jer. li. 58. 

¢ Seductive influence of idolatry (as in xiii. 2, Jer. 1. 2). h xiii. 12-17. i gen. as vii. 3, etc. 

dc he, as well as Babylon; cf. on iii. 20. 1 Jer. xxv. 17-19, 27-29, xxxii. I, also Ps. ἰχχν. 9, Ps. Sol. 
viii. 15. See below at xvi. 19, xix, 15. m cf. Jos. Ant. xvii. 6, 1, xvili. 9, 8, etc. n Cf. on 
zx. 18. o As Mark viii. 38, Acts x. 22, etc. 


1 The tautological Seutepos goes either before (AQ, 1, etc., Areth., Lach., Tr., Al., 
‘WH, Sw., Bj.) or after (pyccCP, min., Me., Pesh., Arm., etc., Ti., Ws.) ayyeAos. 
τοῦ θυμου (om. fuld. 1, 96, Tic., Pr., Cassiod.) as at xviii. 3 (om. S., Pr.) a gloss [Bl., 
9.35, 6]? Cp. xvii. 2. 


24... avtov (om. S.) a gloss? 


grimly writes, drawing on a powerful 
O.T. figure; the passion of God’s hot in- 
dignation will be forced down their throats, 
like a bitter draught (ver. 10). θυμός, how- 
ever, besides translating a Hebrew equi- 
valent for “‘ fury” (Isa. li. 17 f.), is oc- 
casionally a LXX rendering for the ana- 
logous idea of ‘‘ venom” or * poison” 


(man OF ying, cf. Job xx. 16), and 


r 
this would yield a good sense here. 

Vv. 9-11. The third angel proclaims 
that the deliberate adherents of the Im- 
perial cultus are to be held responsible 
for their actions, and punished accord- 
ingly. The object is that these votaries 

nay be ‘**scared into faith by warning of 
sin’s pains”. The plea of force (xiii. 12) 
is no excuse (cf Matt. x, 28. _ 

Ver. 10. κεκερασμένου here as in xviii. 
6 by oxymoron = “poured out,” the 
original meaning of ‘“‘mixed’’ (with 
water) being dropped. The torture (de- 
picted from Isa. xxxiv. 9, 10) is inflicted 
before the holy angels (who evidently sit 
as assessors at the judgment, En. xlviii. 
9), ἁγίων being either an efitheton ornans 
or an allusion to xii. 8-9. Normally 
the prophet refrains from introducing 
such spectators of doom (xix. 20, xx. 
to-14). ‘‘Fire is the divine cruelty of 
the Semitic religions ” (Doughty), but 


(Bj., cf. xiii. 16). 


the torment which Judaism designed for 
fallen angels and apostates is assigned 
here to the worshippers of the Cesars. 
The Apocalypse is silent upon agents 
of torture; they are not the angels, much 
less the devil (who is himself punished, 
xx. 10). But, like 4 Esd. vii. [ver. 36] 
(‘‘the furnace of Gehenna shall be dis- 
closed and over against it the paradise of 
delight ’’), John locates the place of tor- 
ment over against the place of rest. For 
such grim popular fancies Enoch (xxvii. 2, 
3, xlviil. 9, xc. 26, 27) is mainly respon. 
sible; there (as in Clem. Hom, xvii.) the 
tortures proceed under the eyes of the 
righteous, though (especially in the later 
fragments, as in John’s Apoc,) the 
moralisation of the idea has advanced, 
until Gehenna vanishes from the scene 
of bliss. ‘It is impossible for us to 
understand how such a sight could be 
compatible with heavenly happiness” 
(Stanton, ¥ewish and Christian Messiah, 
Ρ. 344; cof. Lecky’s European Morals, ii. 
225 f.), but the psychological basis of the 
ghastly expectation can be verified in the 
cruder types of primitive and modern re- 
ligion. Most critics delete καὶ ἐνώπιον 
Tov apviov as another gloss (cf. on ver. 
4); the position of Jesus after the 
angels is not unexampled (cf. i. 4, 5), 
even if before the holy angels were not 


- 


6---τ3. 


ὦ ΜΕ; a > , ‘ 
[καὶ ἐνώπιον τοῦ ἀρνίου]" τι. Kat 


A A , 
αὐτῶν “ εἰς αἰῶνας αἰώνων * ἀναβαίνει - 
a , ate eer 
ἡμέρας καὶ νυκτὸς οἱ προσκυνοῦντες τὸ θηρίον Kal τὴν εἰκόνα αὐτοῦ, 
\ t 7 , N , a ‘3 ἢ > ~ 
καὶ “et τις λαμβάνει τὸ χάραγμα τοῦ ὀνόματος αὐτοῦ. 
ἡ “ὑπομονὴ τῶν ἁγίων ἐστίν - ot " τηροῦντες τὰς ἐντολὰς “TOD θεοῦ 


Ἀ A x , > fol 
και τὴν “πίστιν ᾿Ιησοῦ. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ΙΏΑΝΝΟΥ 


439 


ὃ καπνὸς τοῦ ἢ" βασανισμοῦ p by meto- 
nymy = 
βασάνον 
(cf. xviii. 
7, 10, 15). 
q XX. 10. 
12. Ὧδε; xviii. 9, 
xix. 3, Isa. 
XXXIV. 10, 
s Grim con. 
trast to 
iv. 8. 


‘ > >» 8 , 
καὶ οὐκ ἔχουσιν " ἀνάπαυσιν 


-“ -“ - , 
13. Kal ἤκουσα φωνῆς ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ “λεγούσης “Γράψον, + = ὅστις 


Μακάριοι ot νεκροὶ οἵ *év Κυρίῳ ἀποθνήσκοντες ἀπάρτι " 


(ὃς ἄν), 
Win. § 
24, 16. 


fe - , 
Nai, "λέγει TO Πνεῦμα, Piva “ ἀναπαήσονται ἐκ τῶν κόπων ( τὴ, το. 


αὐτῶν" 
a 


iv. 19). 
ἃ. Urchrist. 167 f. 

tative (Moult. i. 114). 
etc.), XXil. 14. 
1991. d Cf. Sir. xiv, 19. 


y Contrast x. 4. 


taken (Bs., Baljon) as a periphrasis for the 
divine presence (Luke xii. 8, 9, xv, Io). 

Ver. 12. The prospect of this fearful 
and imminent retaliation is not only a 
warning to weak-minded Christians but a 
consolation to the loyal. To bea saint is 
to obey God and to believe in Jesus at all 
costs. Contemporary Jews took a similar 
encouragement: “if ye endure and per- 
severe in his fear, and do not forget him, 
the times will change over you for good, 
and ye will see the consolation of Zion” 
(Apoc. Bar. xliv. 7). John’s words typ. 
τ. ἐντολὰς τ. 8. are an answer to the com- 
plaint and claim that God’s command- 
ments were being neglected by every one 


except the Jews (cf. the plaintive cry of 


4 Esd. iii. 33: “1 have gone hither and 
thither through the nations and seen their 
abundance, though they remember not thy 
commandments”; 32, “Is there any 
other nation that knoweth thee save 
Israel? yet their reward appeareth not, 
and their labour hath no fruit ”’). 

Ver. 13. The approaching climax of 
retribution upon pagan Rome affects the 
dead as well as the living. The latter 
are encouraged to hold on in hope; the 
former are brought nearer their reward 
(cf. vi. τι, xi. 18). ᾿Απάρτι goes with 
μακάριοι (note here and in Clem. Rom. 
xlvii. the first application of p. to the 
dead saints) rather than with ἀποθνήσ- 
κοντες, and οἱ ἐν x. ἀποθ. (which is time- 
less, like προσκ. t. θ. in ver. 11) denotes 


all who die in the faith, loyal to their 


Lord, i.e., primarily martyrs and con- 
fessors (cf. xiii. 8, 15). They die ‘in 
His fellowship, as it were in His arms” 
{Beyschlag). Like Paul (in 1 Thess. iv. 


a“ A fal ” 
τὰ yap ἔργα αὐτῶν ἀκολουθεῖ pet αὐτῶν. 


aii, 7, etc.; cf. xxii. 16-17. c ] 
ς (Isa. lvii. 1-2) like sec. fut. pass. οὗ καίω. cf. Jannaris, Hist. Greek Gramm. 


Vi ΧΙ χ᾽ 
nom. 
indep., as 
i. 5, etc. 

w not of 
men (Acts 


x ii. 13; cf. Rom. iii. 22, 26, Mark xi. 22, etc. (object. gen.), cf. Seeberg’s der Katech. 
zi Th. iv. 16, 1 Cor. xv. 18; cf. Sap. iv. 7-12. Frequen- 


b Pract. = ore (cf. John viii. 56, ix. 2, 


15), though on different grounds, the 
writer is controverting a fear (cf. 4 Esd. 
xiii. 24) that at the advent of messiah 
those who survived on earth would have 
some advantage over those who had al- 
ready died. ‘Yea, saith the Spirit’”’— 
ratifying what has been said—“ happy to 
rest from their labours”’ (i.e., their Chris- 
tian activities, not the special form of 
their death for the faith). So far as 
the sense is concerned, it matters little 
whether ἵνα κιτιλ. depends on μακάριοι 
or ἀποθνήσκοντες. Both constructions 
are grammatically legitimate, though the 
former is perhaps closer. The point of 
the passage (note πνεῦμα and γράψον, 
as in 1,-ili., xxii. 6 f.) is that the bliss of 
death for a Christian consists not in 
mere rest from labour but in a rest whicu 
brings the reward of labour, While 
death brings the rest, the reward cannot 
be given till the final judgment. Conse- 
quently the near prospect of the latter is 
welcome, among other reasons, because 
it means the long-deferred recompense 
(xi. 18) for the faithful dead. So far from 
being forgotten (ii. 2 f., 19, 23, etc.), their 
épya accompany them to judgment and 
—it is implied—receive their proper re- 
ward there (cf. Milton’s fourteenth son- 
net). The bliss of the departed therefore 
depends upon two grounds: their épya 
are not to be overlooked, and the interval 
of waiting is now (ἀπάρτι) brief. The 
fourth degree of bliss in 4 Esd. vii. [95] 
is that the departed spirits of the just 
understand ‘‘the rest which, gathered in 
their chambers [cf. Apoc. vi. 9-11] they 
can enjoy now with deep quietness, 
guarded by angels, as well as the glory 


4. 40 


e Cf. Abbott, 
: 206 f. θή 
LeeLee fe NRO €vov 
Dalman i. ᾿ 
§ ix. 2. 


AITOKAAYYVIZ IQANNOY 


ΧΙν. 


Ν ‘ 
14. καὶ εἶδον, καὶ ἰδοὺ νεφέλη “λευκή, καὶ ἐπὶ τὴν νεφέλην 
᾿ὅμοιον υἱὸν ἀνθρώπου, © ἔχων ἐπὶ τῆς κεφαλῆς αὐτοῦ 


Ε Cf. on ii. 20, iii. 12, and λέγων (η) or οἱ τηρ. (12) above. 


which still awaits them in the latter 
days’’. John does not share the current 
pessimistic belief (cf. Apoc. Bar. xi.-x1i. 4, 
Verg. Aen. i. 94 f., with Isa. lvii. x f.) that 
death was preferable to life, in view of the 
overwhelming miseries of the age. His 
thought is not that death is happier than 
life under the circumstances, but that if 
death came in the line of religious duty it 
involved no deprivation. The language 
reflects Gen. ii. 2 (with κόπων put for 
ἔργων), but while it is true enough, it is 
hardly apposite, to think of the dead 
as resting from works (Heb. iv. 9), no 
more being needed. ‘The root of the 
passage lies not in the Iranian belief 
(Brandt, 423 f., Boklen, 41) that the soul 
was escorted by its good deeds to bliss 
in another world (cf. Maas, Orpheus, 
217 f.), but in the closer soil of Jewish 
hope (cf. Bacher’s Agada d. Tannaiten,? 
i. 399 f.; Volz 103) as in En. ciii. 2, 3, 
Apoc. Bar. xiv. 12, 13, and Pirke Aboth 
vi. 9 (hora discessus hominis non comi- 
tantur eum argentum aut aurum aut 
lapides pretiosi aut margaritae, sed lex 
et opera bona). In 4 Esd. vii. 35 (where, 
at the resurrection of the dead, “the 
work shall follow and the reward be dis- 
closed”’) ofus may be a Hebraism for 
“recompense” (Ps. cix. 20 ἔργον, cf. 
1 Ti. v. 25). Contemporary Jewish es- 
chatology also took a despairing view of 
the world (cf. 4 Esd. iv. 26-33). But 
while the dead are pronounced “ blessed,” 
é.g., in Apoc. Bar. xi. 7, it is because 
they have not lived to see the ruins of 
Jerusalem and the downfall of Israel. 
Better death than that experience! Death 
is a blessing compared with the life which 
falls upon times so out of joint (x. 6 f.). 
The living may well envy the dead. In 
John’s Apocalypse, on the other hand, 
the dead are felicitated because they miss 
nothing by their martyrdom. Yet life 
is a boon. No plaintive, weary cry of 
Weltschmerz rises from the pages of this 
Apocalypse.—avaratw in the papyri 
means relief from public duties or the 
“resting”’ of land in agriculture (cf. U. 
Wilcken’s Archiv f. Papyrusforschung, 
1. pp. 157 f.). 

Vv. 14-20, in their present position, 
are a proleptic and realistic summary 
of the final judgment, representing as 
a divine catastrophe what xvi.-xvii. 
delineate as the outcome οἵ  semi- 


political movements (cf. xviii. after xvii.). 
The strange picture of messiah (14 f., 
contrast i. 10 f., xix. 11 f.), the absence 
of any allusion to the Beasts (9-11) or to 
the Imperial cultus, the peculiar angel- 
ology, and the generally disparate nature 
of the scene as compared with the con- 
text, point to the isolated character of the 
episode. The abrupt mention of the city 
(20) suggests that the tradition belonged 
to the cycle underlying xi. 1-13 (the 
city, 13), and several critics (e.g., Spitta, 
Erbes, Weyland, Volter, Schon, Briggs, 
Rauch) regard it variously as a finale to 
the oracles of that chapter. But the 
connexion is one of tradition rather than 
of literary unity. The data of style and 
content leave it uncertain even whether 
the episode goes back to a source or a 
tradition, whether it is Jewish (so especi- 
ally Sabatier, Pfleiderer, and Rauch) ar 
Jewish Christian (Schon, Erbes, Bru- 
ston, J. Weiss, etc.), and, if Jewish 
Christian, whether it was written by the 
author of the Apocalypse (Weizsacker} 
or not. The least obscure feature is the 
victory of the messiah over antichrist and 
hj@ legions (not of an angelic judgment 
an Israel, J. Weiss) in the vicinity of 


cain (cf. xi. 13, xiv. 1 f., and xx. ἃ) 


‘at the end of the world, an expectation 
of which we have another variant appar- 
ently in xix. 11 f. Probably the prophet 
inserts the episode here in order to re- 
peat, in a graphic and archaic, although 
somewhat incongruous fashion, the final 
doom of which he has just been speak- 
ing and to which he is about to lead up 
(xv.-xx.) through a fresh series of catas- 
trophes. ‘If one might venture to wish, 
to discard as an interpolation any part 
of the attested text of the Apocalypse, it 
would be this passage. Howcan it be 
understood of anything but the final 
judgment? Yet it comes here as any- 
thing but final. . . . The earth goes on 
just as before” (Simcox). But here, as 
often elsewhere, the clue lies partly 
in the vivid inconsequence of dream- 
pictures, partly in the preacher’s desire 
to impress his hearers, and partly in the 
poetic, imaginative freedom of his own 
mind. 

Ver. 14. This royal, judicial figure is 
evidently the messiah (drawn from Dan.. 
vii. 13, which had been already inter 
preted thus in En. xxxvii.-lxxi. and « 


14—18. 


" στέφανον χρυσοῦν καὶ ἐν τῇ χειρὶ αὐτοῦ δρέπανον ὀξύ. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


441 


15. καὶ h xix, 12. 
x 


ἄλλος ἄγγελος ἐξῆλθεν ' ἐκ τοῦ ναοῦ, κράζων ἐν φωνῇ μεγάλῃ τῷ (heavenly 


καθημένῳ * ἐπὶ τῆς νεφέλης, 


“ Πέμψον ' τὸ δρέπανόν σου καὶ θέρισον, 


ὅτι ἦλθε ἡ " ὥρα ™ θερίσαι, 


ὅτι ἐξηράνθη ὁ θερισμὸς τῆς yas.” 
16. καὶ ἔβαλεν ὁ καθήμενος ἐπὶ τῆς νεφέλης τὸ δρέπανον αὐτοῦ 


ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν, καὶ ἐθερίσθη ἡ γῆ. 


17. καὶ ἄλλος ἄγγελος ἐξῆλθεν ἐκ τοῦ ναοῦ τοῦ ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ, 


ἔχων καὶ αὐτὸς δρέπανον ὀξύ. 


τοῦ " θυσιαστηρίου, ὁ ἔχων 1 ἐξουσίαν ° 
φωνῇ μεγάλῃ τῷ ἔχοντι τὸ δρέπανον τὸ ὀξὺ λέγων, 


18. καὶ ἄλλος ἄγγελος ἐξῆλθεν 


temple). 
k Cf. Dalm. 


6, cf. 
Mark xiii 
28 parl. 


>. N viii. 3-5: 
ΕΚ prayers of 
\ a martyrs ? 
ἐπὶ TOU πυρός, καὶ Epuvyge , Anes of 
snow, 
hail, 
thunder, 


lightning, fire, etc., in Jub. ii. 2. Here = viii. 5, the angel of fire. 


1 Before exwv Lach., Al., Tr. (marg.), Ws. [WH], [Sw.] add the o of AC, vg., 


Syr., S. 


Esd. xiii.). The crown (omitted in i. 13 
f.) was a familiar appurtenance of deity 
in Phrygia (e.g., of Apollo); for the cloud 
as the seat of deity, cf. Verg. Aen. ix. 
638-640, etc. 

Ver. 15. ἄλλος ἄγγελος, as in ver. 6. 
The alternatives are (a) to translate 


“another, an angel” (quon mn) 
which might be the sense of the Greek 
(cf. Od. i. 132, Clem. Protrept. 1x. 87. 3) 
but is harsh, or (δ) to take the figure of 
ver. 14 as an angel (Porter) and not as 
the messiah at all (which, in the face of 
i. 13, is difficult). The subordinate and 
colourless character of the messiah is 
certainly puzzling, and tells against the 
Christian authorship of the passage. 
Messiah is summoned to his task by an 
angel, and even his task is followed up 
by another angel’s more decisive inter- 
ference. He seems an angelic figure 
(cf. on xix. 17), perhaps primus inter 
pares among the angels (so En. xlvi. 1: 
‘“‘and I saw another being [7.6., the Son 
of Man] whose countenance had the ap- 
pearance of a man, and his face was full 
of graciousness, like one of the holy 
angels”). The conception was incon- 
sistent with John’s high Christology, but 
he may have retained it, like so much 
else, for its poetic effect, or as part of 
a time-honoured apocalyptic tradition. 
That the messiah should receive divine 
instructions through one of his comrades 
(Heb. i. 6, 9; cf. Zech. ii. 3, 4) was perhaps 
not stranger than that he should require 
an angel in order to communicate with 
men (i. I). πέμψον κιτιλ. The double 


figure of judgment (harvest and vintage) 
is copied from the poetic parallelism of 
Joel iii. 13 ; the independent rendering of 


προ by πέμψον and ἔβαλεν, and the 
change of agent from messiah (14-16) 
to an angel (17-20, so Mark xiii. 39 f.), 
show that the writer is using the Hebrew 
of that passage (where God does the 
reaping). 

Ver. 16. The δρέπανον (only here, xiv. 
14-19, in Apocalypse; cf. C. B. P. ii. 
652 f. for a Phrygian inscription καὶ τὸ 
ἀρᾶς δρέπανον εἰς τὸν ὗκον αὐτοῦ) is 
represented as a living thing, probably 
like the δρέπανον πετόμενον of Zech. 
v. τ (Wellhausen). The classical use of 
reaping to symbolise death and destruc- 
tion is too common to need illustration. 
“The harvest of the earth is ripe and 
dry,” but this ripeness of paganism for 
judgment (Jer. li. 33) is re-stated drama- 
tically (17-20) in a parallel O.T. symbol 
from the wine-press. The angelic mise- 
en-scene recalls that of viii. 3-5. Unlike 
the harvest-symbol, the vintage-symbol 
is worked out vividly (cf. Gen. xlix. 11; 
Isa. Ixiii. 1 f.). 

Ver. 18. πυρός. The figure of this 
angel (=Jehuel in rabbinic tradition, 
Gfrérer, i. 369) has an Iranian tinge. 
The justice of the punishment is attested 
by its origin in the purpose of one who 
corresponded to the Persian Amshas- 
pand (cf. on i. 4), Ashem Vahishtan, who 
presided over fire and at the same time 
symbolised the closely allied conceptions 
of goodness, truth, and right in Zoroas- 
trian mythology (cf. H. F., 1904, 350)- 


442 


p Lk. vi 


44. 
q xix. 15, cf. 
Ezek. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ἸΏΑΝΝΟΥ 


XIV. 19g—20. 


“ Πέμψον σου τὸ δρέπανον τὸ ὀξύ, 


καὶ Ῥτρύγησον τοὺς βότρυας τῆς ἀμπέλου τῆς γῆς, 


χχχν. 6. ὅτι ἤκμασαν αἱ σταφυλαὶ αὐτῆς." 

“oblong 19. καὶ ἔβαλεν ὁ ἄγγελος τὸ δρέπανον αὐτοῦ εἰς τὴν γῆν, καὶ 
a la ἐτρύγησε τὴν ἄμπελον τῆς γῆς Kat ἔβαλεν εἰς “ τὴν "ληνὸν τοῦ 
ΕΓ on θυμοῦ τοῦ θεοῦ τὸν μέγαν. 20. καὶ “ ἐπατήθη ἡ ληνὸς "ἔξωθεν τῆς 

ΑΝ πόλεως, καὶ ἐξῆλθεν ᾿αἷμα ἐκ τῆς ληνοῦ ἄχρι τῶν χαλινῶν τῶν 


6, 3, Vi. 


, , ε ΄ 
2? vi 6, ἵππων, ἅ ἀπὸ σταδίων χιλίων ἑξακοσίων. 


3, εἴς. 

t The red ἢ 
juice of the vine (Deut. xxxii. 14). 
(only here in this sense in Apoc.). 


1 


u John xi. 18, xxi. 8 (cf. Blass, 95): at most a Latinism 


1 And. (comm.), reading (with 79) χιλ. efax. εξ. [διακοσιων, $y, 26, 5.1, explains the 
number symbolically as the perfection of wickedness; tooo being the most perfect 
of numbers, the deluge occurring in the 600th year of Noah, and the creation (now 
stained and corrupted) being completed on the 6th day. 


A similar representation of an angel 
speaking from the fire in connexion with 
providence occurs in Chag. 14 ὃ. 

Ver. 19. The ungrammatical τὸν μέγαν 
may be due to the fact that Anvds is 
occasionally masculine (Win. § 8. 10; 
Helbing, 46), or—by a rough constr. ad 
sensum—to apposition with τὸν θυμόν 
(understood). 

Ver. 20. The heathen are stamped and 
crushed till their blood gushes out of the 
wine-press to the height of a horse’s 
bridle and to the extent of about two 
hundred miles. This ghastly hyper- 
bole, borrowed partly from Egyptian 
(wine=the blood of those who fought 
against the gods) and partly from Jewish 
eschatology (En. c. 3: “‘and the horses 
will walk up to the breast in the blood 
of sinners, and the chariot will be sub- 
merged to its height”), happens to be 
used later by the Talmud in connexion 
with the carnage at Bether (cf. Schlatter’s 
Die Tage Trajans, p. 37; also Sib. iii. 
633 ἔ,; 4 Esd. xv. 35; Sil. Ital. iii. 704). 
The place is to be a veritable Senlac 
(sang lac).—amé x.t.X., probably a round 
number (see crit. note) compounded out 
4 and its multiples (like 144,000 out of 
12), to denote completeness (Vict. =per 
omnes mundi quattuor partes). After 
the fall of Rome (xiv. 8 f.), the rest of 
the world (ex hypothesi impenitent, xiv. 
6-8) is ripe for the traditional (Dan. ix. 
26) judgment. The same sequence is 
teproduced roughly and on a larger scale 
in xVii.-xviii. (fall of Rome) and xix.-xx. 
(doom of other nations). This parallelism 
and the sense of the Joel passage militate 
against the attractive idea that xiv. 14- 
16 is the ingathering of the saints (so 


Alford, Milligan, Bruston, Briggs, Titius, 
Gilbert, and Swete).—é§wOev x.t.A. This 
fearful vengeance is located by Jewish 
tradition in some valley (of Jehoshaphat 
=Yah judges?) near Jerusalem (Joel), 
on the mount of Olives (Zech. xiv. 4), or 
in Palestine generally (Dan. xi. 45; οἷ. 
below on xvi. 16), i.¢., as a rule in close 
proximity to the sacred capital, where 
the messiah was to set up his kingdom. 

After this partial anticipation of the 
final catastrophe, the Apocalypse returns 
to a fuller and independent description 
of its processes (xv. 2-4=xiv. I-5, XV. 
I, 5-xvi.=xiv. 6-11, 14-20). The pano- 
rama of the prelude is once more seven- 
fold, but this time seven angels (under 
the control of God, xvi. 9) drench the 
earth with plagues from seven bowls 
which are brimming with the divine 
anger. The vision is a poetical expan- 
sion of Ley. xxvi. 21 (προσθήσω ὑμῖν 
πληγὰς ἑπτὰ κατὰ τὰς ἁμαρτίας ὑμῶν, 
cf. 18, 24, 28). The plagues, like Hab- 
bakuk’s theophany, recall the Egyptian 
plagues (Exod. vii.-x.), but their descrip- 
tion is less impressive than the previous 
cycles of punishment. Like the seven 
trumpets (viii. 2-5), they are introduced 
by a scene in heaven (xv. 2-4); ver. I is 
merely a title or frontispiece to what 
follows (5 f.), since the angels do not be- 
come visible till 5 (cf. viii. 1-2, 6), and 
do not receive their bowls till 7. This 
θαυμαστόν (awe-inspiring) σημεῖον is 
the sequel (ἄλλο) to that of xii. r f., and 
the plagues are final (1 ἐσχάτας), in 
contrast to the trumpet-plagues (ix. 20), 
as they represent the wrath of God which 
can no longer be repressed (xvii.-xix.= 
the working out of these plagues, cf. xvi 


SS a ὅν 


XV. I—3. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


443 


XV. 1. Kat εἶδον ἄλλο σημεῖον ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ μέγα kala C/. Exod, 


XV. II. 


" θαυμαστόν, ἀγγέλους ἑπτὰ ἔχοντας πληγὰς ἑπτὰ τὰς ἐσχάτας, ὅτι " x. 7. 


ΕἸ 3 Ὁ 
εν QUTQLS 


ἃ «αλί Ξ 
θάλασσαν “ὑαλίνην μεμιγμένην πυρί, καὶ τοὺς νικῶντας ἐκ τοῦ 


, 1 ~ A ~ ~ ~ 
“ θηρίου καὶ ἐκ τῆς εἰκόνος αὐτοῦ καὶ ἐκ τοῦ ἀριθμοῦ τοῦ " ὀνόματος 


᾿ ἐτελέσθη ὁ “θυμὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ. 


ΟὟ. 17, Xi. 
2. Kal εἶδον ὧς 18, 
div. 6, same 
scene 
(cf. ver, 7 
substan. 
tially. 


a a 5... 
αὐτοῦ ἑστῶτας ᾿Ἶ ἐπὶ τὴν ὅ θάλασσαν τὴν “ ὑαλίνην, ἔχοντας ἢ κιθάρας ε xiii. 17, 


τοῦ Θεοῦ. 


a ΓΙ 204 a eee: m\s 
Θεοῦ καὶ Thy ὠδὴν τοῦ dpviou, ™ λέγοντες, 


h ν. 8, xiv. 2. i Xiv. 3, 
m From Song of Three Child. 4. 


12 f., xix. Ig, xvii. 1). Like ch. xvi., to 
which it forms an overture, xv. is not the 
revision of a Jewish source (so especi- 
ally Spitta, Ménégoz, and Schmidt) but 
Christian (Briggs, Erbes) and the work 
of the Apocalyptist himself (Sabatier, 
Schon, Bousset, etc.) 

Vv. 2-4. An interlude like xix. 1 f. 
The manifestation of divine judgment 
(4) evokes reverence (contrast xvi. 11) 
and praise from the saints in heaven. 

Ver. 2. vex. ἐκ x.7.A., ‘those who 
came off conquerors from ”—another 
pregnant use of ἐκ (cf. ii. 21, viii. 11) 
combining the ideas of victory over (cf. 
on ii. 7) and deliverance from. A pos- 
sible Latinism (cf. Livy viii. 8, uictoriam 
ferre ex aliquo; xlv. 38, aliquis est Romae 
qui triumphari de Macedonis nolit ?) ἢ 
The prophet paints the downfall of the 
Roman persecutor in terms of the Jewish 
tradition preserved, e.g.,in Targ. Jerus. 
(on Exod. xii. 42) which singled out four 
memorable nights, that of the creation, 
that on which God’s promise of a son 
came tu Abram, that of the tenth Egyp- 
tian plague, and that on which the world 
is ended (when Moses appears in a cloud 
from the wilderness and messiah in a 
cloud from Rome, led by the Word of 
the Lord). Cf. Schemoth Rabba on 
Exod. xii. 2: ex quo Deus mundum 
suum elegit, determinauit principium 
mensis redemptionis, quo liberati sunt 
Israelitae ex Aegypto, et quo liberabuntur 
futuro saeculo. In time as well as in 
method (cf. on viii. 6, and 1 Cor. x. 1-11) 
the two redemptions, Mosaic and mes- 
sianic, are to correspond.—rrupt, a truly 
Red sea, red with the glow of God’s 
wrath. Like Pharaoh and his host 
(Exod. xv. 5, to=Apoc. xviii. 21) the 
persecutors of God’s people in these latter 
days not only fail to effect their purpose, 
but are themselves destroyed by God’s 
vengeance (cf. xvi. 2). The faithful get 


iv. 11. 


yee te ‘ 204 k , ἀν} 1 , ~ Xx 
3. καὶ ᾿ᾷδουσι τὴν ὠδὴν " Μωυσέως τοῦ ' δούλου τοῦ ες Elsewhere 


in Apoc. 
(Vv. 13, Vii. 
I, X. 2, 5, 


; : 5 = ) ἐπὶ 
g Cf. use of δρακόντων in Ps. Ixxiv. 14, LXX. (Apoc. xiii, 2, 11, and 1 Macc. i 
i k On form, cf. Win. § 5, 20 c, Helbing, 59. sihee 9 
For sequence of thought, see Jude, 5 f. 


1 Cf. Heb. iii. 5-6. 


through their sea of troubles, resisting 
threats and persuasions, and now stand 
safe at (i.e., on the shore of) the hea- 
venly sea. ‘‘ Duteous mourning we fulfil / 
In God’s name ; but by God’s will / Doubt 
not the last word is still / victory” (Ὁ. α. 
Rossetti). Here, as at xii. τὶ the thrill 
of triumph is enhanced by the fearful 
odds against which the saints had to 
contend. Apparently the world is now 
tenanted by pagans only, God’s faith- 
ful having been removed. Hence the 
plagues are all-embracing (contrast vii. 
ἘΣ Οὗ χα 2: 

Ver. 3. As in Exod. xiv.-xv. Moses 
leads Israel in a song of praise to God 
over the dead Egyptians, so, after Rome’s 
downfall (xiv. 8 f., ver. 2) the faithful are 
led by their captain (xii. 11, xiv. 1, 4, cf. 
Heb. ii. 12), in a chant of triumph and 
gratitude. (Note the lack of any refer- 
ence to their own sufferings. Their in- 
terest is in the great work of God.) For 
messiah as a second Moses in Jewish 
tradition, cf. Gfrérer, ii. 328 f. The song 
on the Red Sea had already been adapted 
to the worship of the Therapeutae (Philo, 
de uit. contempl. § χὶ.)--- τὴν δὴν τ. a. 
There is a continuity in redemption, 
which unites the first deliverance to the 
final. True to his cardinal idea of the 
identity of God’s people (Christians be- 
ing the real Israel, cf. on i. 6), the pro- 
phet hails Jesus as the Christian Moses 
who, at the cost of his life, is commis- 
sioned by God to deliver the new Israel 
from their bondage to an earthly mon- 
archy. The lyric with its Hebrew paral- 
lelisms is a Vorspiel of the succeeding 
judgments; it resembles (cf. E.Bi. 4954) 
the benediction after the Shema of Juda- 
ism (“ἃ new song did they sing to Thy 
name, they that were delivered, by the 
seashore; together did all praise and 
own Thee as King, saying, ‘ Yahveh shall 
reign world without end’”), and is al- 


444 


““ Μεγάλα καὶ " θαυμαστὰ τὰ ἔργα σου, 


Κύριε 6 θεὸς ὁ ° παντοκράτωρ ° 


Ρ δίκαιαι “ καὶ ἀληθιναὶ αἱ " ὁδοί σου, 


ὃ " βασιλεὺς τῶν ἐθνῶν. 


μὴ , ue 
OTL μονος οσιοξς᾿ 


4 v , Q m” o A , 5.» , 
ὅτι “πάντα τὰ ἔθνη ἥξουσι καὶ προσκυνήσουσιν “evaTidy 3 


σου: 


α ὅτι τὰ δικαιώματά σου ἐφανερώθησαν.᾽᾽ 


cf. Sam. A gon. 293 f. 
of Col. iii. 16. 
cf. Lk. xviii. 7). 
8. exlv. 17. 
xix. 8 (diff. sense). 


v Ps. Ixxxvi. 9, Mic. vii. 15 f. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LTQANNOY 


"τίς οὐ μὴ "φοβηθῇ, Κύριε, καὶ δοξάσει τὸ ὄνομά σου; 


ΧΥ 


mn ver. 1,1 
Chron. 
XVi. 8-12, 
etc. 

oi. 8. 

p From Ps 
cxlv. 17, 
Zech. 
viii. 8 
LXx, 
Dan. iii. 

27-28, iv. 


7. 
q Cf. on xvi. 


Cle 

τ Deut. 
XXXii. 4, 
Isa. Xxvi. 
8, LXX, 


s From Jer. x. 6-7 (om. LXX), Zech. xiv. 9; cf. on xi. 18. An instance 
t aor. due to ‘‘emphat. negative or rhetorical nat. of question" (Burton, 172, 
Ὁ only here and xvi. 5 (N.T.) of God; cf. Deut. xxxii. 4, Ps. Sol. χ 6. From 


w iii. 5, xvi. 9. x = “Because. δικ. Ξξ 


1 The ay.wv of the Textus Rec. represents a tr. of sctorum (a corruption of sclorum) 
= εθνων of SycaAPQ, min., Me., Arm., Aeth., And., Areth., Cypr., Amb., Pr. (edd.), 
which has been conformed, in a:wvwv (ΝΟ, vg., Syr., S., so Selwyn, WH), to 
1 Tim. i. 17 (cf. En. ix. 4, Tob. xiii. 6, το, Clem. Rom. lv., Ixi.). 


most entirely composed of O.T. phrases. 
Adoration is its theme, stirred by the 
sense of God’s justice. Similarly the 
famous hymn to Shamash, the Assyrian 
god of justice, which represents one of 
the highest reaches in ancient religious 
literature (Jastrow, pp. 300, 301) : ‘‘ Eter- 
nally just in the heavens are thou, / Of 
faithful judgment towards all the world art 
thou.” Most editors take the phrase καὶ 
τὴν od. τ. ἃ. as a gloss; but if the song 
has nothing to do with the Lamb, it is as 
silent on Moses. Since the whole section 
comes from the pen of the general author, 
and since the collocation of the two wSat 
(equivalent of course to a single hymn) 
is awkward mainly in appearance, while 
the omission of the Lamb’s Song would 
leave the section incomplete, it seems 
better to regard it as original rather than 
as a scribe’s addition like xiv. I0, etc. 
As in xiv. 1, 3, the Lamb is among his 
followers, yet not of them. 

Ver. 4. God's holiness is the reason 
why his name must be feared and mag- 
nified, especially when its effects are 
visible in the reverent homage of all 
nations to God (a hyperbolical statement 
in view of xvi. 9, etc.) at the sight of his 
“deeds of judgment” (δικαιώματα -- 
judicial sentences, here of condemnation 
and penalty) inflicted on the world (cf. 
Dan. ix. 14 ἢ). The absolute and unique 
(note the prophet’s insertion of pévos) 
reign of Yahveh was a traditional tenet 
of Mosaism; indeed for Orientals gener- 
ally the power which formed their ideal 


source of righteousness and justice par- 
took necessarily of a monarchic charac- 
ter (R. S. 74 f.). To the Semites it 
appeared that the perfection of their god 
as a just king formed a ground for his 
ultimate sovereignty over the nations 
of the world. The O.T. outlook and 
the phraseology warn us not to press 
the poetical language too closely here; 
otherwise (cf. xiv. 6, 7) it would con- 
tradict, ¢.g., the characteristic idea of 
the author that the bowl-plagues, in- 
stead of producing penitence and sub- 


mission, gadded in defiant blasphemy.— 
ἐνώπιόν Gov, here a reverential periphra- 
sis, it beit# considered in the later O.T. 


literature, the Targums, and the N.T. 
(occasionally) more respectful to wor- 
ship and pray before the royal god than 
directly to him (Dalman, i. viii. 5). For 
the whole conception of this dual song 
see Targ. Jonath. on Isa. xxvi. 1 and 
Targ. Schir Haschirim i. 1; the latter 
reckons ten songs altogether, (1) Adam’s 
at his forgiveness, (2) that of Moses and 
the Israelites at the Red Sea, (3) that of 
the Israelites, when the spring of water 
was given them, (4) that of Moses at his 
death, (5) Joshua’s at Gibeon, (6) that of 
Barak and Deborah, (7) Hannah's, (8) 
David’s, (9) Solomon’s, and (10) that 
which the children of the captivity are 
to sing when the Lord frees them. It 
tallies with this expectation that the 
new song of the Apocalypse (v. 9, xiv. 
3) is always a song of Christ’s redemp- 
tion. 


4-8. XVI.1-2 ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 445 


‘ A A , - Lol A 

5. ᾿ καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα εἶδον, καὶ *Hvolyn ὁ ναὸς τῆς "σκηνῆς τοῦ y Fresh 

, a it Η Ὦ stage in 

“μαρτυρίου ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ: 6. Kal ἐξῆλθον οἱ ἑπτὰ ἄγγελοι ol vision, Ν 
see on lV. 


ἔχοντες τὰς ἑπτὰ πληγὰς " Ex τοῦ ναοῦ, “ ἐνδεδυμένοι Atvov! καθαρὸν ᾿. ; 
ay pS 1 e , ‘ ᾿ 40 , ne z already in 
αμπρὸν καὶ “ περιεζωσμένοι περὶ τὰ στήθη ζώνας χρυσᾶς. 7. xi. το. 
, a > a ΄ , on a A 5 ᾿ , a See Acts 
καὶ ἐν ἐκ τῶν τεσσάρων ζῴων ἔδωκε τοῖς ἑπτὰ ἀγγέλοις ἑπτὰ vii. 44 
᾿ a a κ᾿ a ie ae only). 
‘dudhas χρυσᾶς "γεμούσας τοῦ θυμοῦ τοῦ θεοῦ “tod ζῶντος εἰσ ἢ ΡΝ, 
A a 5 A a 17. 
τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων. 8. καὶ ' ἐγεμίσθη ὁ ναὸς καπνοῦ ἐκ THS cx. 8, τα. 
κ d cf. Acts x. 
30 (i. 10). 
> “" ~ ~ 
εἰσελθεῖν εἰς τὸν ναὸν ἄχρι τελεσθῶσιν at ἑπτὰ ᾿ πληγαὶ τῶν ἑπτὰ © S94 
15. 75. 
fv. 8f. 


XVI. 1. Kal ἤκουσα μεγάλης " φωνῆς ἐκ τοῦ ναοῦ λεγούσης ὅ HY. 10, 


τοῖς ἑπτὰ ἀγγέλοις, “Ὑπάγετε καὶ " ἐκχέετε τὰς ἑπτὰ φιάλας Tod, ΧΙ: τῆς 
γῆν. 42. καὶ ἀπῆλθεν ὁ πρῶτος καὶ “fo vii. 
ἐξέχεε τὴν φιάλην αὐτοῦ εἰς τὴν γῆν " καὶ ἐγένετο “ ἕλκος κακὸν καὶ i Isa. vi. 4. 
πονηρὸν " ἐπὶ ᾿ τοὺς ἀνθρώπους τοὺς ἔχοντας τὸ χάραγμα τοῦ θηρίου Ξε ab at 
i” S τ Kings 
viii. ro-rr, also 2 Chron. vii. 2. (cf. 2 Chron. vii. 3 with ver. 2 above and iv. 10). I ver, 1 
ἃ Of God (Isa. Ixvi. 6), cf. xv. 8. Ὁ For form, cf. Win. § 13, 23. ς viii. 5, Jer. x. 25, Zeph. 


iii. 8, Ps. xix. 24. d Exod. ix. 10-11, Deut. xxviii. 35, Job ii. 7, Luke xvi. 21. e Cf. Lukei. 
65, iii. 2. f xiii, 15-17, xiv. 9-10. 


δόξης τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ ἐκ τῆς δυνάμεως αὐτοῦ - “kal οὐδεὶς ἐδύνατο 


ἀγγέλων. 


ϑυμοῦ τοῦ θεοῦ eis τὴν ° 


1 For the λινον (λινους δῷ, λινουν min., Lat.) of PQ, Syr., S., And., Arm., Areth., 
etc. (Al., Ws., Ti., Bs., Bj., Sw.), Lach., Tr., Diist., WH, Sp. read the transcrip- 
tional (AIOON for AINON) error AvBov AC, 38 mg., 48, go, etc. (from LXX of Ezek. 
xxviii. 13 ?—Awov being commonly used of flax, not of flaxen garments. Cf. Nestle’s 


Einj., 263). 


XV. 5-xvi. I: the introduction to the 
seven bowls or plagues. 

Ver. 5. The temple in heaven is here 
“the tent (or tabernacle) of witness,” as 
it represents God’s judicial revelation 
_and presence ; its contents and the move- 
ments of which it forms the source, are 
evidence of God’s covenant with his 
people. 

Ver. 6. These heavenly beings are 
magnificent creatures, robed in gold and 
light (a Hellenic conception, Dieterich, 
38 f.) and linen (to denote their honour- 
-able and sacred office: so the scribe of 
judgment, Ezek. ix. 2, and the angel in 
Dan. x. 5, xii. 6). Plutarch (de Iside, 3, 
4) explains that the linen surplice was 
affected by Egyptian votaries of Isis for 
religious reasons; é.g., the bright smiling 
colour of flax, its freedom from lice, and 
the smooth, cleanly material it yielded. 

Vv. 7, 8. The φιάλαι, shallow bowls 
-or saucers, do not exhale a smoke (like 
the censer of viii. 4) grateful to God; they 

_are filled with poisonous, hot, bitter wine, 
while the smoke pours from the divine ma- 
jesty, whose intense holiness (ver. 4, as 

‘in O.T. theophanies) is breaking out in 

~judgments against human sin (δόξα =the 


divine δύναμις in action or expression). 
Smouldering fires of indignation are now 
on the point of bursting into punishment 
from the arsenal of anger. Hence, till 
the plagues are over, God’s presence is 
unendurable (as in Enoch xiv. 18 f.). 
This emphasis on the unapproachable, 
austere majesty of God is consonant 
with the general religious feeling re- 
flected in the Apocalypse (cf. on i. 2). 
CHAPTER XVI.—VWv. 2-21.—The series 
(first three εἰς, last four ἐπὶ) of these 
plagues as usual consists of four and 
three; the former, as in the seals, 
affecting earth (i.e., votaries of the Im- 
perial cultus), sea, waters, and the sun. 
The special object of the writer in this 
passage (i.e., to introduce the doom of 
Rome and the worshippers of the Em- 
peror) leads him to vary the materials 
drawn from the Egyptian plagues which 
had been already used in the correspond- 
ing series of the trumpet-visions (viil.-ix.) 
by defining precisely the victims of the 
first plague as worshippers of the Beast, 
by substituting the throne and realm of 
the Beast in the fifth plague for mankind 
in general, in the sixth by connecting 
the Parthian invasion with the Beast 


XVI. 


3. "καὶ ὁ δεύτερος 
Bal ἐγένετο αἷμα ὡς. 
τὰ ἐν τῇ θαλάσση. 4. 
καὶ 


εἰς τοὺς ποταμοὺς 


5. καὶ ἤκουσα Tob: 


446 ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ [QANNOY 

g ἄρα vii‘ καὶ ‘rods προσκυνοῦντας τῇ εἰκόνι αὐτοῦ. 
ἫΝ oo ἐξέχεε τὴν φιάλην αὐτοῦ εἰς τὴν θάλασσαν " 

h maths νεκροῦ, Kal πᾶσα ᾿ ψυχὴ ζωῆς ἀπέθανεν, * 
ποῖα καὶ ὃ τρίτος ἐξέχεε τὴν φιάλην αὐτοῦ ᾿ 
inv’ τὰς ἱ πηγὰς τῶν ὑδάτων - καὶ " ἐγένετο αἷμα. 

iGen,i30 " ἀγγέλου τῶν " ὑδάτων λέγοντος, 
7 Wik “ἐὁ Δίκαιος εἶ, 

κ ἘΠΕ ΡΝ Ρὁ ὧν καὶ ὁ ἦν, 6 “ ὅσιος, 
ρος 9 "ὅτι ταῦτα ἔκρινας " 
Qe 6. ὅτι," αἷμα 1 " ἁγίων καὶ "προφητῶν * ἐξέχεαν, 

νη 1of., “apes sat ht οΝ u a 
Exod. vii καὶ αἷμα αὐτοῖς ἔδωκας " πεῖν " 
iene 3: * ἄξιοί εἰσιν.᾿ 

en i 7. Kat ἤκουσα τοῦ θυσιαστηρίου λέγοντος, 

Ἂ eee ᾿ “ναί, Κύριε ὁ θεὸς ὁ * παντοκράτωρ, 
rhea 7 ἀληθιναὶ καὶ δίκαιαι αἱ κρίσεις cou.” 
vii. 1) of 
fire (xiv. 18). o Ps. cxix. 137 f. exlv. 17; cf. Job, xxxvii. 23. 


cf. xv. 4; of Jesus, Heb. vii. 26. 
Viii. 9 etc. 
t xi. 18, xviii. 24. 


V iii. 4; from Sap. xviii. 4 (of eee asyndeton = 
y xix. 1-2, Ps. xix. 


use of vocative in Apoc. X XV. 


p xi. 17 _q (vocative), 


τ God’ s rights, shown in judgments, Ps. ‘Sol. ii. 16 f., 38 f., 
8 xvii. 6, xix. 2. Ps. Ixxix. 2-3, Is. xlix. 26, Sib, Or. iii. 212, Ps. Sol. viii. 23). 
u Ch. John iv. 7, 9; for form in papyri, cf. Deissmann, 182-3, Helbing, 11. 


“85 they deserve”. w Rare (xi. 17, xv. 3} 
9: ἀληθ. = just, synonym for δικ. as 


John viii. 16, Xen. Anad ii. 6, 26, So below, xix. 2, and Isa. lix. 4, LX 


1The Hebraistic (= ὩΣ Ἴ) atpara of N, 36, 39 is preferred here and at xviii. 


24 by T1., Bs., Swete. 


itself, in the seventh by introducing 
Rome’s fall among the physical disasters, 
and in the prologue by making the 
plagues come from God’s initiative with- 
out intercession (as viii. 3 ἢ). How far 
these new touches are original or due to 
the influence of current traditions no 
longer extant, it is impossible to deter- 
mine. This series of plagues is simply 
a free adaptation, with modifications and 
applications, of that in viii.-ix. ; the pro- 
phet wishes to emphasise, by the genu- 
inely Semitic method of recapitulation 
(cf. (Gen ahi gat Pes Στ ΤΥ, παῖδ.) ἘΠΕ 
sure and speedy approach of judgment. 

Ver. 2. The sixth Egyptian plague, 
“ἃ noisome and painful ulcer” (the pun- 
ishment of the impious and rebellious, 
according to Philo, de Execr. v. 6) breaks 
out on the adherents of the Czsar-cult. 

Ver. 3. ‘‘Coagulated blood,” fatal to 
animal life (as in first Egyptian plague). 
This plague is final, as compared, e.g., 
with that of viii. 8. 

Vv. 4-7. No more drinking water. 
The justice of this particular plague is 
acknowledged by (5-6) the angel of the 
element in question and by (7) the altar 
(personified here, in line of vi. 9, 10, and 
viii. 3, or of xiv. 18), which echoes the 
angel’s cry. 


Ver. 5. ὅσιος and δίκαιος are used to- 
gether of God in hieratic inscriptions of 
dedication throughout Asia Minor, pos- 
sibly under Jewish influence. “Δίκαιος, 
often a title of messiah (see on iii. 1 and 
Beer’s note on En. xxxviii. 2), is reserved 
here for God. Retribution is the out- 
cofne of God’s intense holiness or ma- 
jésty (cf. vi. το, xv. 4) asserting itself on 
bébalf of his people (xv. 3, xix. 2, cf. 111. 
7) and in self-vindication. 

Ver. 6. The retribution once threatened. 
on Jerusalem and the Jews (Matt. xxiii. 
35) is now transferred apparently to 
Rome, the later antagonist of the faith 
(cf. on xviii. 24). Once the Romans 
made Christian blood run like water. 
Now, by the irony of providence, they 
shall find nothing but blood to drink. 
This moral vengeance (cf. Hawthorne’s 
House of the Seven Gables), with its 
grim equivalence between sin and sin’s 
punishment (xi. 18, xiii. 10, xviii. 7; cf. 
2 Tim. ii. 12, etc.) is not pushed, how- 
ever, into the grotesque and elaborately 
Dantesque details, e.g., of the Apocalypse : 
of Peter. —é§éxeav (the verb runs all 
through this chapter, and this chapter 
only), cf. Dittenberger’s Sylloge Inscript. 
Graec. 8167 (I cent. A.D.) ἐγχέαντας τὸ - 
ἀναίτιον αἷμα aSixws.—ay. κ΄ πρ.» all 


3—14. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


44? 


8. καὶ ὁ τέταρτος ἐξέχεε τὴν φιάλην αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ τὸν ἥλιον - z Constr. vi 


‘ 


ΓΕ a 
καὶ “ ἐδόθη " αὐτῷ " καυματίσαι “τοὺς ἀνθρώπους ἐν πυρί: 


‘ 4, etc. 
9. KGltaz.ec. the 


ὦ ᾿ A sun, 
ἐκαυματίσθησαν ot ἄνθρωποι “ καῦμα μέγα, καὶ " ἐβλασφήμησαν τὸ b Contrast 


»” A A aA a 

ὄνομα τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ ἔχοντος τὴν ἐξουσίαν ἐπὶ τᾶς πληγὰς ταύτας, 
‘A col ~ 

καὶ οὐ μετενόησαν * δοῦναι αὐτῷ δόξαν. 


‘ , A 
THY φιάλην αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ τὸν *Opdvov τοῦ θηρίου - καὶ ἐγένετο ἡ 


vil. 16 
with this 
scorch- 
10. καὶ ὁ πέμπτος ἐξέχεε ing. 

ε C generic, 
or with 
ref. to 


, ~ “- - 
βασιλεία αὐτοῦ ἢ ἐσκοτωμένη * καὶ ! ἐμασῶντο τὰς γλώσσας αὐτῶν 2 6, 


κ 


al , Ν A a 
ἐκ τοῦ “πόνου IT. καὶ ἐβλασφήμησαν τὸν θεὸν ™Tod οὐρανοῦ ἐκ 


> d vii. 16 
am. dey. 
is 


a 1 , » A 4 a an 4 . 
τῶν ' πόνων αὐτῶν καὶ ἐκ τῶν ἑλκῶν αὐτῶν, καὶ οὐ " μετενόησαν “ex. ΚΠ, 


ες 


~ » > ~ 
των Epy@v αὐτων. 


“τὸν ποταμὸν τὸν μέγαν “ Εὐφράτην - ἢ καὶ “ ἐξηράνθη τὸ ὕδωρ 


Ῥ αὐτοῦ, ἵνα ἑτοιμασθῇ 686s τῶν βασιλέων τῶν ἀπὸ ἀνατολῆς 


ἡλίου. 


στόματος τοῦ θηρίου καὶ ἐκ τοῦ στόματος τοῦ "ψευδοπροφήτου 
πνεύματα “ τρία " ἀκάθαρτα, ὡς ἦ βάτραχοι - 14. εἰσὶ γὰρ πνεύματα 
δαιμονίων ἥ“ ποιοῦντα σημεῖα ἃ ἐκπορεύεται ἐπὶ τοὺς βασιλεῖς τῆς 


g xiii. 2; = kingdom, Prov. xvi. 12, xx. 28, xxv. 5. 
ot τῆς βασ.; cf. Apoc. Pet. 28-29. 
13, Dan. ii. 19. n ii. 21-22. 
Win. § 15, 58, § 20, 96. 


12. kat 6 ἕκτος ἐξέχεε τὴν φιάλην αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ 


Ν a “ A 
13. καὶ εἶδον ᾿ ἐκ τοῦ στόματος τοῦ ὃράκοντος καὶ ἐκ τοῦ 


k = ἀπό Mt. xvi. 26. 
o ix. 14; see Gen. xv. 18, Deut. i. 7, etc. On abs. of article, cf. 
p Cf. Josh. iii. 17, Zech. x. 11. 


\ f Inf. of 
conceived 
result or 
tendency 
(Burton, 
371), cf. 
ν. 5; 
usually 
with 
ὥστε. 
The hope 
of xiv. 
6f., xv. 4 
is disap- 
pointed. 

i Se. 

m Xi. 


ἢ viii, 12, Ps. cv. 28, Exod. x. arf, 
1 xxi. 4, Just. A pol. i. 8. 


q Isa. xi. 15, xliv. 27. τ Posi- 


tion of phrase “one of several traces of a tendency to attempt the rhetorical order of ordinary 


Greek” (Sx.). 
trast to three angels of xiv. 6f. ὃ 


Dragon here seen by seer for first time (οὐ, xii. 1, xiii. 1). 
u Marki. 26, etc. 


S xiii. 11. t Con- 
v For frogs as specially odious agents 


of Ahriman, cf. Plut. de Iside, 46; source of plagues and death (SBE. iv. 203). For irreg. constr., 


cf. ἔχων in xiv. 14. 
if 


prophets are ἅγιοι, but all ἅγιοι are not 
prophets. 

Ver. 9. Failure to honour the true 
God, a note of the heathen spirit (as in 
xi. 13, xiv. 7; Rom. i. 28). See Introd., 
§ 6. For the general idea, cf. 2 Clem. 
ix.: ‘‘while we have opportunity of be- 
ing healed, let us give ourselves over to 
God the healer, giving him a recom- 
pense. And what recompense? Repen- 
tance from a sincere heart... . Let us 
give him eternal praise.” 

Vv. 10-11. The ninth Egyptian plague 
of darkness (due to the eclipse, cf. viii. 
12?) falls on Rome, aggravating the pre- 
vious pains of the Romans (ver. 2) and 
driving them into exasperation and fresh 
blasphemy instead of repentance. The 
repetition of rz ὦ, after 9, is characteris- 
tic of Oriental impressiveness (cf. Jer. 
XXX. 2, xxxi. I, etc.), but it sums up the 
effect of the first four plagues. 

Vv. 12-16. To facilitate the invasion of 
the empire (xvii. 12, 16) by the Parthians 
(ix. 14 f.) under Nero redivivus (cf. xix. 
19), as in 4 Esd. xiii. 43-47 to let the ten 
tribes return in safety from captivity, the 
Euphrates is to be dried up in the latter 
days, like the Jordan before Joshua or 


W xiii, 13, xix. 20, Matt. xxiv. 24, 2 Th. ii. 9. 


the Euphrates itself when Cyrus cap- 
tured Babylon (Herod. i. τοι). 

Ver. 13. βάτραχοι, perhaps a remini- 
scence of the second Egyptian plague, 
but probably an Iranian touch; the frog 
was a special agent of Ahriman in the 
final contest (cf. reff., H. ¥. 1904, 352, 
and Hiibschmann, 230, 231). According 
to Artemidorus (ii. 15) frogs represent 
γοήτας καὶ βωμολόχους, and they were 
naturally associated with serpents (cf. 
Plut. Pyth. 12) as amphibious. 

Ver. 14. ‘“‘They are (not, these are) 
spirits of daemons”. These devilish 
imps muster God’s opponents to the final 
conflict. The fierce invasion of the 
kings of the east seems to give an im- 
petus to the kings of the world. Anti- 
christ’s power extends to these (cf. xi. 
10). ‘As the Lord sent his apostles to 
all the nations, so shall he (t.e., Anti- 
christ) send false apostles” (Hippol. vi. 
cf. A. C. 188 f.). The sources of the 
tradition lie in Addit. Esther, xi. 6 f., 
where the two dragons cry, and at their 
summons all nations gather to do battle 
against the righteous nation; also in the 
belief that Israel’s foes muster against 
her in the latter days (xvii. 14, xix. 17-20, 


ATIOKAAY¥VIZ ITQANNOY XVI. 


448 


xxvii.14, οἰκουμένης ὅλης, συναγαγεῖν αὐτοὺς " εἰς τὸν πόλεμον τῆς * ἡμέρας 
Xix. Ig-21. Ὁ in ae 

y ay here τῆς μεγάλης Tod θεοῦ τοῦ ἡ παντοκράτορος. [15. ““᾿Ιδοὺ * ἔρχομαι 
ef 1: ΤΟΥ Δ ς 


νί. τ7) ἰη ὡς " κλέπτης. μακάριος ὃ γρηγορῶν καὶ τηρῶν τὰ ἱμάτια αὐτοῦ, 


Apoc. Ὁ Re π᾿ Δ κ᾿ , N > , ee te 
zVer.7. ἵνα μὴ “ γυμνὸς περιπατῇ Kal βλέπωσι τὴν ἀσχημοσύνην αὐτοῦ.᾽᾽] 
8 lil. II, ν ἃ ’ > x > x , 4 , ec ” ‘ 

xxii. 7,12, 16. καὶ “ συνήγαγεν αὐτοὺς εἰς τὸν τόπον τὸν καλούμενον Εβραϊστὶ 


20. ἊΝ tee Ν mL 
biii.3,1 ‘ Appayeddv.2 17. καὶ ὁ ἕβδομος ἐξέχεε Thy φιάλην αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ τὸν 
ἘΠ ve. ε 32 Ν Pye! A , > ~ ἀν ΒᾺΝ - , 
ciii. 18; of ἢ ἀέρα - καὶ ἐξῆλθε φωνὴ μεγάλη ἐκ τοῦ ναοῦ ἀπὸ τοῦ θρόνου 
Lk. xii. 
36-37 
ἃ Sc. δαιμόνια. 


e ix. 11. f Cf. SC 263f:= "TDD ΓΤ; Megiddo, a classic scene of 


rout for Israel's foes (cf. xix. 11, 14 = Judg. v. 20), like the plain of Chaeronea, δὴ Ἄρεως ὀρχήστρα. 
g ix. 2 (Encycl. Rel. and Ethics, i. 2521. and Rohde's Psyche, 415f., 548f., 609f.), haunt and home of 
spirits, etc., Philo, de gig. ὃ 2, Eph. ii. 2, vi. 12, Yasht. xiii. 12-13, and Plut., de Istde 26. 


1 The variant epxyerat (ἡ, 38, 47, S., Pr.) is an attempt to smooth out the abrupt- 
ness of this interjected warning, which echoes the synoptic tradition rather than 
the Jewish law that it was a deadly offence for a priest to lack “‘complete and clean 
apparel” (Sanh., 83, 1, cf. Selwyn, 197). The extreme awkwardness of the verse 
in its present setting suggests that it is an interpolation or misplaced gloss, which 
has crept into the text owing to the above association of ideas (so, e.g., Vischer, 
Spitta, Schén, Volter, Rauch, Weyland, von Soden, Simcox, Briggs). Beza trans- 
ferred it to precede iii. 18, Kénnecke (Emendationen zu Stellen N.T., 35-37) to 


between iii. 3a and 3b, when it would complete the ἰδού series of ii. 22, iii. 9, 20. 
2 Ap Μαγεδων ($A, min., And., Ar.) is preferred by WH (313) and Swete. 


xx. 7-10; after Ezek. xxxviii-xxxix.; Zev, 
xiv. 2 f£.; En. lvi, xc.; Sib. Or. iii. JS 
322, 663-674). In Asc. Isa. iv. Beliar, in 
the guise of Nero, comes ‘‘and with him 
all the powers of this world, and they 
will hearken to him in all that he desires” 
(cf. below on xvii. 13, 17). These de- 
monic spirits are not crushed till the day 
of judgment (En. xvi. 1 ἕως τῆς κρίσεως 
τῆς μεγάλης, Jub. x., Matt. viii. 29). 
The three locusts which issne from the 
mouth of the Beast in Hermas, Vis. iv. 
1. 6, belong to the conception of Apoc. 
ΙΧ Τὶ 

Ver. 16. A double thread of tradition is 
woven into this strand of prophecy, (a) 
that of a last conflict of the world-powers 
with God and the messianic people (cf. 
xvii. 14, xix. 19) and (δ) that of Rome's 
ruin by the Parthians under Nero redivi- 
vus. Thetwo were originally distinct, but 
the apocalyptist naturally twists them to- 
gether, although he never clears up their 
relationship. Here 13-16 is an enigmatic 
summary of what is variously depicted 
further on. But, though an erratic block 
in its present setting, it may have been 
placed here by the final editor, in his 
characteristically proleptic manner. 
Strictly speaking, the sixth plague is 
confined to ver. 12.—‘Appayedav, where 
the messianic Josiah will triumph, is (a) 
either to be located in mythology rather 
than in geography, as a mount where 


* 


the final conflict of the gods is to be 
fought out (so fallen angels in En. vi. 
5, 6 at mount Hermon)— in which case 
the phrase is a survival of some apoca- 
lyptic myth no longer intelligible to John 
(Gunkel, Bousset)—or (δ) to be taken as 
an allusion to the hills near the plain (in 
the light of Judges v. 18, 19, iv. 6, 12, 14; 
Ezek. xxxviii. 8, 21, xxxix. 2, 17). By 
gematria the name is equivalent to 


soya m1 (Ewald, Hausrath), 
but neither this nor the proposal to take 
“J as a corruption of Ὁ) (city, so 
Hitzig, Hilgenfeld, Forbes), much less of 


NY (Aram. = yu: Volter), is natural. 


Cf. for further etymological and mytho- 
logical suggestions, Nestle (Hastings, 
D. B. ii. 304, 305), Cheyne (E. Bz. i. 
310, 311), and Legge and Cheyne in 
Proc. Society of Bibl. Arch. 1900, ii. 2. 
Bruston’s interpretation (Ερμα -- ἀνάθεμα, 
Γεδᾶν, cf. Num. xiv. 45, xxi. 3; Judges 
xx. 45) is far-fetched, but there may be 
some link between this obscure fragment 
of tradition and the cycle of Gog and 
Magog (cf. Cheyne in E. Bi. 11. 1747, 
1748). 

17-21: the seventh bowl and plague as 
the climax of all. 

Ver. 17. The temple (xi. 19) and the 
throne (viii. 3) are again blended in one 
scene. In Isa, Ixvi. 6 the divine ven- 


15—2I. 


” 
λέγουσα, ““" Γέγονε᾽᾽. 
βρονταὶ καὶ * 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


3 * 
σεισμὸς ἐγένετο μέγας, ‘olos οὐκ ἐγένετο ἀφ᾽ οὗ 


449 


Ν ‘ . 
18. καὶ ' ἐγένοντο ἀστραπαί καὶ φωναὶ Kath xxi. 6, cf. 
Ζ 


Χχχίχ. 8. 
Liv. 5. 


ἄνθρωπος ἐγένετο ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, τηλικοῦτος σεισμὸς οὕτω μέγας. k viii. 5, xi. 


10. καὶ ™ ἐγένετο ἡ πόλις ἡ μεγάλη “eis τρία μέρη, καὶ al πόλεις 
τῶν ἐθνῶν ἔπεσαν - καὶ ” Βαβυλὼν ἡ " μεγάλη " ἐμνήσϑη ἐνώπιον τοῦ 
θεοῦ, δοῦναι αὐτῇ τὸ ἢ ποτήριον τοῦ οἴνου τοῦ “ θυμοῦ τῆς ὀργῆς 


αὐτοῦ. 


καὶ ᾿ χάλαζα μεγάλη ὡς " ταλαντιαία καταβαίνει ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ ἐπὶ 
τοὺς ἀνθρώπους ᾿ καὶ " ἐβλασφήμησαν οἱ ἄνθρωποι τὸν θεὸν ἐκ τῆς 


20. "kal πᾶσα νῆσος ἔφυγε, καὶ " ὄρη οὐχ εὑρέθησαν. 


13,10, Jer. 
XXiil. 19. 
,« 1 From 

Ass. Mos, 


21. 
χχῖν. 21 
and 

Shaks. 
Jul. C. 


πληγῆς τῆς χαλάζης " Ste” μεγάλη ἐστὶν ἣ πληγὴ αὐτῆς σφόδρα. ως. ὁ win. 


n Jer. li. 58, Dan. iv. 30. 
loose use of infin., cf. ver. 9. 
8 Judith, xvi. 15, Sir. xvi. 19, etc. 
N.T.; figur. = ‘ colossal”, 


p Isa. li. 17, 


Vv verr. 9-II. 


geance is heralded by φωνὴ ἐκ ναοῦ, φωνὴ 
Κυρίου ἀνταποδιδόντος ἀνταπόδοσιν τοῖς 
ἀντικειμένοις. 

Ver. 18. The conventional storm- 
theophany brings on an exceptionally 
severe earthquake, which (ver. 19) shatters 
Jerusalem into three parts and entirely 
overthrows the pagan cities. Rome’s 
more awful ruin is attributed in xvii. 16 
to the invasion of Oriental hordes (cf. 
xvi. 12); here the allusion to her down- 
fall is proleptic (=xvii. 2, xviii. 6 f.), as 
a climax to the foregoing catastrophe. 
Probably the great city is Jerusalem (so 
e.g., Andr., Bengel, Simcox, B. Weiss, J. 
Weiss), as in xi. 8. She is distinguished 
from the Gentile cities as Rome also is 
singled out from her allies and adherents. 
Being primarily guilty, Rome-Babylon 
is reserved for aspecial fate. The whole 
passage is enigmatic and obscure. Did 
the earthquake destroy the inhabitants 
of Jerusalem? and why? The allusion 
must be to some form of the tradition 
underlying xi. 1-13 and xiv. 18-20, or to 
that of Zech. xiv. 4, 5. Both earth- 
quakes and invasions had been combined 
already in the O.T. eschatology (cf. Isa. 
xiii. 13 f.; Hag. ii. 21 f.); both perils were 
real, at this period; and, in delineating 
both dangers with a free, poetic imagina- 
tion, the prophet aims as usual at im- 
pressiveness rather than at any 
systematic regularity. For earthquakes 
in Jerusalem, cf. G. A. Smith’s ¥eru- 
salem, i. pp. 61 ἔ---ὀδθμνήσθη : neither 
magnificence nor age wins oblivion for 
an empire’s crimes against the moral 
order. 

Ver. 20. Here, as at vi. 14, the re- 
moval of hills tallies with the Iranian 
belief (shared by later Jewish Christian 
apocalyptic, cf. Béklen, 131 f.) that 


0 xviii. 5, Acts = 
δῖ. XXV. 15. 

t Exod. ix. 18-25, Ezek. xiii. 11, Sib. iii. 6ρο ἔ, 
“ w μέγας for the fifth time in 17-21. 


§ 29, 2b. 


1. The false concord éuv. δοῦναι is due to writer's 


q Cf. xiv. 8, το. ἘΎΪ T4,/XXs Ti 


ἃ am. dey. 


mountains as the work of Ahriman would 
disappear with him (S. B. E. v. 129), 
leaving the earth in its ideal state of a 
smooth plane on which mankind could 
dwell in unity of speech and intercourse, 
free from barriers. The collocation of 
mountain and island (so vi. 14) is pos- 
sibly a relic of the ancient point of view, 
for which (i.e., for dwellers in the West) 
these formed the apparent source of the 
s 5 Tising, where his light first became 
visible. 

Ver. 21. Even an abnormal hail- 
shower (cf. the fourth Egyptian plague) 
fails to bring pagans to their senses. 
ὡς TaX., 7.¢., literally about sixty times 
the weight of even the enormous hail- 
stones (μνααῖαι) which Diodorus Siculus 
(xix. 45) records. In En. lx. 17 the 
‘spirit of the hail is a good angel,” i.e., 
amenable to God’s orders. 

The obscurity of chapter xvii. springs 
mainly from the differences oftradition and 
outlook which are reflected in the canoni- 
cal text. The threefold interpretation of 
the Beast as the Imperial power (so xiii.), 
as Nero redivivus (ver. 8) and as (11) the 
eighth king (the two latter being applica- 
tions of the same idea) is accompanied 
by a twofold explanation of the seven 
heads (geographical=g, historical=1o), 
and of the woman’s support (1, 3, 15). 
The eschatological tradition of Babylon 
as the supreme anti-divine world-power 
is applied to Rome, and this involves 
the re-interpretation of some details (e.g. 
15, 18), while the tradition of the Beast as 
antichrist is further overlaid by the 
special tradition of Nero redivivus in 
that capacity. This dual Beast (as Vélter 
first recognised; cf. Charles’s Ascensio 
Tsaia, pp. |x.-lxi.) is not merely the Im- 
perial power (as in xiii. 3) but incarnate 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


XVII. 


XVII. 1. Kat ἦλθεν εἷς ἐκ τῶν ἑπτὰ ἀγγέλων τῶν ἐχόντων τὰς 


ἑπτὰ φιάλας, καὶ "ἐλάλησε pet ἐμοῦ λέγων “Δεῦρο, δείξω σοι τὸ 


450 
a xxi. 9. 

4 
in an Imperial personality of infernal 
and supernatural character, which 


attacks not only the Christian messiah 
(x4) but Rome itself (16-17). The 
latter trait is unmistakably due to the 
legend of Nero redivivus, apart from 
which the oracle is unintelligible. Such 
variations have left traces in the structure 
of the passage, which point to some pro- 
cess of editorial revision, but it is difficult 
to disentangle the original source or 
sources, or even to determine their pre- 
cise character and period. Ver. 14 is 
certainly out of place, for the allies of 
the Beast could not destroy Rome after 
they themselves had been destroyed by 
the messiah and his allies. it is thus 
either proleptic or inserted by the Chris- 
tian writer in his (Jewish) source (so e.g., 
Vischer, Charles, Briggs, von Soden). 
Other traces of this editor might be 
found in 6 ὁ, 8 (9 @?), and 15, and the 
Jewish character of the source (so Vis- 
cher, Weyland, Schmidt, Sabatier, Méné- 
goz, etc.), would be confirmed by the 
absence of any polemic against the Im- 
perial cultus. It would be a Vespasianic 
oracle, inspired by a passion for revenge 
on Rome for her cruel, recent treatment 
of the Jewish people. When the source 
is regarded as Christian (as e.g., by 
Erbes, Vélter, and SchGn), ver. rr would 
be an addition inserted under Domitian 
to bring it up to date (so Harnack, Texte 
u. Unters. 11. iii. 134 f.; Chronologie, 
245, 246, followed by Briggs, Gunkel, J. 
Weiss, etc. ; cf. Introd. § 7). But even 
so, the structure of the passage is in- 
volved. Vv. g-II are not vision but 
calculation or exposition (cf. xiii. 18). 
The waters of ver. 15 are never seen (cf. 
I, 3), and the professed explanation (ver. 
7) follows a loose order (beast=8, heads 
=9g-1I, horns=12-14, waters=15, horns 
again= 16-17, and finally the woman= 18). 
The reference to the woman, however, 
is thrown late in order to introduce the 
following doom-song (cf. kings in 18, 
Xviii. 3, 9, and great in 18, xvili. 2), and 
a similar motive accounts for the ir- 
regular position of 16-17 after 14, Rome’s 
fall, though viewed from different angles, 
being the main object before the writer’s 
mind at the moment. The defeat of 14 
is taken up, in its true position, after- 
wards (xix. 11-21). Ver. 15 (an echo of 
xvi. Ig δ) is probably thrown in at this 
point, to contrast dramatically the re- 


volt [16] of Rome’s supporters against 
her. Thus, except for g-11, there are 
sufficient psychological reasons to ac- 
count partially for the order and con- 
tents of the oracle; but source-criticism 
is required to clear up the passage, in 
the more or less extensive theories of 
one source (edited in 6, 9 a, 14-15, 50 
J. Weiss; or variously in 8, 12-14, with 
some words in 6, 9, 11, so e.g. Pfleiderer, 
Baljon, Bousset and Forbes) or even 
two sources (Jewish, A=3-4, 6 6-7, 10, 
B=11-13, 16 b-17, Wellhausen’s Analyse, 
26 f.), for which the linguistic idiosyncra- 
sies (double use of γέμειν, 3-4, preced- 
ence of object over verb 13, 16, 18, οἱ 
K. τ. γ. 2, and the construction BA. τ. 6. 
ὅτι ἦν, 8) afford some basis. The 
main problem is to explain how the 
various strata of tradition overlap; ¢.g., 
in 8, 12f., the beast is Nero redivivus, 
an infernal power of evil, whereas in Ir 
Domitian seems identified with Nero the 
beast. It is hard to believe that one 
and the same writer could simultaneously 
regard Domitian as a second Nero and 
expect Nero redivivus as a semi-super- 
natural power. In any case the stress 
falls on the Beast rather than on the 
woman, and on the eschatological pre- 
diction, not on the historical applica- 
tion. It is a fairly open question 
whether 8 or 11 is the editorial mortar 
super-imposed upon the earlier tradition. 
Upon the whole, one of the least un- 
satisfactory solutions is to take Ir as a 
Domitianic gloss by the Christian editor, 
who has also added 6 6 (if not all of 6) 


and 14 to a Vespasianic oracle (possibly — 


of Jewish origin) in xvii. 4 f. which anti- 
cipated the downfall of persecuting 
Rome at the hands of Nero redivivus 
and his Eastern allies. No hypothesis 
is free from difficulties. But the 
general Domitianic reference of the 
Apocalypse and the presence of the 
Nero redivivus saga must be worked in 
somehow, and some hypothesis on the 
above lines seems to do most justice to 
the literary structure of this chapter as 
well as to the data of the book in gene- 
ral. 
far the Christian editor worked over his 
source. That the difficulties of the 
oracle arise mainly from the presence of 
an earlier source (cf. Introd. § 7), which 
John has revised slightly and brought up 
to date, is axiomatic, however. 


It is impossible to determine how © 


ATIOKAAYYVIZ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 


I—4. 


451 


κρίμα τῆς " πόρνης τῆς μεγάλης, “τῆς καθημένης ἐπὶ “ ὑδάτων b C/. on xiv. 


“πολλῶν - 


ς From Jer, 
1. 13. 
2. μεθ᾽ ἧς ἐπόρνευσαν die.” 
ea “ nA a peoples 
ot βασιλεῖς τῆς γῆς, (ver. 15). 
ν ἃ , cg a ~ e Visits of 
καὶ ἐμεθύσθησαν * ot © κατοικοῦντες Thy γῆν Herod, 
a a a Tiri- 
ἐκ τοῦ οἴνου τῆς πορνείας αὐτῆς. dates, 


‘ a etc. 
3. καὶ ἢ ἀπήνεγκέ pe εἰς ἔρημον ‘év πνεύματι " καὶ εἶδον γυναῖκα s Note 
‘ ΄ irreg. 
καθημένην ἐπὶ θηρίον * κόκκινον, γέμοντα ὀνόματα βλασφημίας, Chanve of 


ἔχον κεφαλὰς ἑπτὰ καὶ κέρατα δέκα. 4. καὶ ἡ γυνὴ ἦν ' περι- Wins, 
, τὰ a κ , \m , , ὃ 
βεβλημένη "᾿ πορφυροῦν καὶ κόκκινον, καὶ "᾿ κεχρυσωμένη χρυσίῳ, xi, 8: 
omitting 
usual ἐπί. 


Cf. on xxi. 10. 


ii. 10, iv. 2, xxi. 10. k xviii. 12, 16; cf. Matt. xxvii. 28 (colour of Roman 
soldier’s mantle). ii 


1 χίϊ. α. m xviii. 16, ἅπ. λεγ. N.T. 


1 γεμον ονοματων (min., Hipp., S., And., Areth.) and yepov ονοματα (S¥cQ, min., 
Bj.) seem corrections of the unusual (in this book) and harsh constr. ad sensum 
Ὑεμοντα ovopata SQ*AP, Lach., Ti., WH, Sw., Bs. [yepov ta ονοματα, as in ver. 4, 
Tr., Al., Diist., Ws.]: for the exov of Q, 1, etc., Syr., And., Areth. (Lach., Al., Bj., 


Ws.), Ti., WH marg., Bs. read exovta (δ ΒΡ) and WH εχων (A, min.). 


The double object of the oracle is (a), 
by a re-editing of the tradition of xiii. to 
represent Rome in her Imperial pride, 
before describing her downfall, and (6) 
to define more precisely the final appear- 
ance of the last foe. The chapter could 
readily be spared as isolated (Simcox), 
but this only proves that the author is 
again working upon disparate materials 
which he inherited. Theoracle contains 
(1-6) a vision of the Harlot (by way of 
foil to xii. 1-6 and especially xxi. g f.) and 
‘the Beast, with (7-18) an explanation of 
the vision. 

CuHaPTeR XVII.—Ver. 1. A _ fresh 
vision commences (cf. iv. 1), still puni- 
tive (xvi. 1), but with an exchange of 
angelic cicerones (as Slav. En. xxi.). 
The Beast which has already (in xiii.) 
done duty as the empire is now the sup- 
port of the capital. Rome, personified 
(so Sib. Or. iii. 46-92, before 80 A.D.) as 
a feminine figure, rides on a beast of the 
same colour, like a Bacchante on the pan- 
ther, or like the Syrian Astarte on a lion. 

Ver. 2. Tyre’scommercial intercourse 
with the nations (Isa. xxiii. 17) and 
Assyria’s political intrigues, by which 
her statecraft fascinated and seduced 
other states (Nah. iii. 4) are both de- 
scribed by the same figure. Local and 
national cults, as a rule, were left un- 
disturbed by the Romans; and indeed 
Oriental superstitions often reacted 
powerfully on Rome itself. But fresh 
conquests meant the extension of Rome’s 
4ntoxicating and godless suzerainty. 


Ver. 3. The wilderness was the tradi- 
tional site of visions, but there may be an 
allusion here to Isa. xxi. I or even to 
the Roman Campagna (Erbes). The 
woman in xii. is in the desert to be de- 
livered from the dragon; the woman 
here is in the desert to be destroyed by 
the Beast. κόκκινον ‘‘crimson or scar- 
let,” =luxurious and haughty splendour 
(Mart. ii. 39; Juv. Sat. ili. 283 and xiv. 
188 for purple). The Beast which in xiii. 
I bore the names of blasphemy upon its 
head, now wears them spread over all its 
body. Baldensperger (15-16) conjectures 
a similar reference to Rome in En. lii. 
(seven hills ?) ; here at any rate the author 
is sketching the Roman Empire in its 
general magnificence and authority under 
the Czesars, and the inconsistencies in 
his description (waters and wilderness, 
seat on waters, seat on the Beast) are 
natural to this style of fantastic sym- 
bolism. It is curious that no attack is 
directed against the polytheism of the 
Empire. Cf. Cebes’ Tabula: ‘‘Do you 
see a woman sitting there with an invit- 
ing look, and in her hand a cup? She 
is called Deceit; by her power she be- 
guiles all who enter life and makes them 
drink. And what is the draught? De- 
ceit and ignorance.’”’ The mounting of 
divine figures on corresponding beasts is 
a Babylonian trait (S. C. 365). 

Ver. 4. κεχρυσ. goes by an awk- 
ward zeugma with λίθῳ (collective) καὶ 
papyapitats; “with ornaments of gold 
and precious stones and pearls’ (like 


452 


N Xviii. 12, 


καὶ "λίθῳ τιμίῳ καὶ 
16, Ezek. 


AITOKAAY¥VIZ IQANNOY 


n 4 3, © Ψ 
μάργαριταις, aii ποτήριον 


XVII. 


° χρυσοῦν ev 


aad 13° TH χειρὶ αὐτῆς γέμον ἢ βδελυγμάτων kal τὰ ἀκάθαρτα ae 4 πορνείας 


ojer.li.7; αὐτῆς, 5. καὶ ἐπὶ 


τὸ μέτωπον 


re ὄνομα 


SS asd apes ai ΟΣ 


ἐπέσανε (* Μυστήριον),} “ pains ἡ μεγάλη; ἡ ᾿μήτηρ τῶν πορνῶν καὶ τῶν 


Comus 

67f. | βδελυγμάτων τῆς yis.” 
Pp xxi. 27, a 

cf. Lev, TOU 

Xviii. 

26-29, 

Sap. xii. 


6. καὶ εἶδα τὴν γυναῖκα ἣ“ μεθύουσαν ἐκ 
᾿ αἵματος τῶν ἁγίων καὶ ἐκ τοῦ αἵματος τῶν μαρτύρων ᾿Ιησοῦ. 
καὶ " ἐθαύμασα ἰδὼν αὐτὴν “ θαῦμα μέγα. 7. καὶ εἶπέ μοι ὁ ἄγγελος, 


. (ς Διατί ἐθαύμασας ; ἐγὼ ἐρῶ σοι τὸ μυστήριον τῆς γυναικὸς καὶ 
23-24 xiv. μ ; ἐγ ρ μυστήριον τῆς Ὑ 


ri 
customs 
of idol- 
atry). 

q Cf. Sap. 
aa : 

τ Sc. ἦν. 

s2 Th. ἢ )ὲ <% 

ἐπ (πα ἃ 
11-12. 

u Cf. Isa. 
Xxxiv. 17, xlix. 26. ν XViii. 24. 

x Diabolic antithesis to divine figure of iv. 8. 

b xiii. 8. 


καὶ τὰ δέκα κέρατα. ὃ. 


τὸ ὄνομα ἐπὶ τὸ " βιβλίον τῆς ζωῆς " ἀπὸ καταβολῆς κόσμου, 


τοῦ θηρίου τοῦ βαστάζοντος αὐτὴν τοῦ ἔχοντος τὰς ἑπτὰ κεφαλὰς 


, 
τὸ θηρίον "ὃ εἶδες ἦν καὶ οὐκ ἔστιν" 


καὶ μέλλει ἀναβαίνειν ἐκ τῆς " ἀβύσσου καὶ εἰς ἀπώλειαν " ὑπάγει. 
ὶ “θαυμασθήσονται οἱ κατοικοῦντες ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, ὧν οὐ γέγραπταν 


© βλε- 


w am. Aey. N.T. (contrast xiii. 3); for Attic ἐθαυμάσθην. 


y ix. 1. Zz xiii. 3 (Blass, § 18, 3). 8. 111: 5e 


ς Irreg. gen. absol. or appos. to ὧν, as weAA. Acts xxvi. 22. 


1 μυστήριον = the explanatory gloss of a reader, from ver. 7 (KOnnecke, 37). 


Ezekiel’s doomed prince 6f Tyre). The 
harlot in Test. Fud. xiii. 5 was also 
decked ἐν χρυσίῳ καὶ μαργαρίταις and 
poured out wine for her victims. Rome 
is pronounced luxurious, licentious and 
loathsome. Here, as in the contem- 
porary 4 Esd. iii. 2, 29, it is felt to be a 
mystery that prosperity and permanence 
should belong to a state flaunting its im- 
piety and oppression, not merely enjoying 
but propagating vice. 

Ver. 5. Roman filles de joie wore a 
label with their names thus (Juv. vi. 
123). μυστήριον (which hardly belongs 
‘to the title itself) indicates that the name 
is to be taken πνευματικῶς (xi. 8), not 
literally; ‘‘a name written which is a 
symbol,” or a mysteriously significant 
title—pytyp K.T.A., Rome, the natural 
focus of Oriental cults in general, is 
charged with fostering all the supersti- 
tious and vicious practices of her sub- 
jects.—B8eX. (partly justified by a perusal 
of Petronius and Apuleius) is an apt 
rebuke if it comes from the prophet of a 
religion which one Roman _ historian 
classed among the atrocia aut pudenda 
which disgraced the capital (Tacit. Ann. 
xv. 44). 

Ver. 6. Cf. Nahum’s ‘bloody city” 
(of Assyrian cruelty to prisoners, iii. 1), 
and for the metaphor Cic. Phil. ii. 24, 
29, or Suet. Tiberius, 59, or Pliny, H. N. 
xiv. 28, ‘‘quo facile intelligatur ebrius 
jam sanguine ciuium, et tanto magis 
eum sitiens,” also Jos. Bell. v. 8, 2. 
When a Jewish source is postulated, 


Kal... Ἰησοῦ is bracketed (e.g., by 
Vischer, Spitta, S. Davidson, Briggs, 
Charles and others) as from the hand of 
the later Christian editor, who here, as 
in xviii. 24 (Mommsen), is thinking of 
the condemnation of provincial prisoners. 
to fight with gladiators or wild! beasts in the 
arena of the capital. The ἅγιοι of the 
source would thus be defined as, or sup- 
plemented by, Christian martyrs. They 
are not contaminated, like the rest of 
men, but their purity is won at the ex- 
pense of their life. The Jewish martyrs 
would be those killed in the war of 66- 
70, primarily. The whole verse, how- 
ever, might be (cf. xviii. 24) editorial ; 
it is the contaminations, rather than the 
cruelties, of Rome which absorb the in- 
terest of this oracle. 

Vv. 7-18. An explanation of the 


vision, cautiously but clearly outlining. 


the Nero-saga. 

Ver. 8. As the Beast seen by the seer 
cannot be described as non-existent, it 
must denote here (as in xiii. 3 f., though 
differently) not the empire but the em- 
peror, or one of its own heads. Such aw 
identification was natural in the ancient 
world especially, where a king and his 
capital or state were interchangeable 
terms. The emperor, here Nero redivi- 
vus (cf. the saying of Apollonius, cited 
in Philostr. Vit. Afol. iv. 38: “ Regarding 
this wild beast,”’ t.e., Nero, ‘‘I know not 
how many heads he has”’), embodied the 
empire. The Beast is a sort of revenant.. 
To rise from the abyss was the conven- 


me 


5—12 


πόντων» τὸ θηρίον ὅτι ἦν καὶ οὐκ ἔστι Kal παρέσται. 
ε 
ὃ ἔχων σοφίαν. αἱ ἑπτὰ κεφαλαὶ ἑπτὰ “ὄρη εἰσίν, ὅπου ἡ γυνὴ 


κάθηται ᾿ ἐπ᾽ αὐτῶν. το. καὶ βασιλεῖς 


ὁ εἷς ἔστιν, ὁ ἄλλος οὔπω ἦλθε - καὶ ὅταν ἔλθῃ, © ὀλίγον αὐτὸν " δεῖ; 


μεῖναι. 
A 4 
ἐστι, καὶ "ἐκ τῶν ἑπτά ἐστι, καὶ εἰς 


τὰ δέκα "' κέρατα ἃ εἶδες δέκα "" βασιλεῖς εἰσίν, οἵτινες βασιλείαν α 


ii. 5. 


tional origin of the Beast (cf. xi. 7) even 
infthe primitive tradition; the Nero-anti- 
christ, however, introduces the fresh 
horror of a monster breaking loose even 
from death. True, he goes to perdition 
eventually, but not before all except the 
elect have succumbed to the fascination 
of his second advent. The Beast of the 
source here is evidently the antichrist 
figure of xi. 7 (also a Jewish source) 
transformed into Nero redivivus. There 
is less reason to suspect the hand of the 
Christian editor in 8 (Bousset) than in 
g a (Jj. Weiss). 

Ver. 9. ὄρη; cf. Prop. iii. 11, 57 (‘‘ Sep- 
tem urbs alta iugis, quae praesidet orbi”’), 
Verg. Georg. ii. 534. 

Ver. 11. Bruston takes καὶ ἐκ τῶν 


ἑπτὰ ἐστιν as a translation of 7) 


NWT ΓΖ ΩΓ, in the sense that the 


eighth was more (or greater) than the 
seven, 1.é., realising more fully the ideal 
of the Beast. But even were the case 
for a Hebrew original clearer than it is, 
such an interpretation is forced. The 
verse is really a parenthesis added by 
John to bring the source up to date. 
Domitian, the eighth emperor, under 
whom he writes, is identified with the 
true Neronic genius of the empire; he is 
a revival and an embodiment of the per- 
secuting Beast (cf. Eus. H. E. iii. 17, 
Tert. Afol. 5: portio Neronis de crude- 
litate, de pallio 4:. a sub-Nero) to the 
Christian prophet, as he proved a second 
Nero to some of his Roman subjects (cf. 
Juvenal’s well-known sneer at the ca- 
luus Nero). This does not mean that 
John rationalises Nero redivivus into 
Domitian, which would throw the rest of 
the oracle entirely out of focus. Domitian, 
the eighth emperor, is not explained as 
the Beast which was and is not and is to 
come up out of the abyss (ver. 8), but 
simply as the Beast which was and is 
not; no allusion is made to his term of 
power, and the concluding phrase καὶ eis 
ἀπ. ὑπάγει is, simply the conventional 
VOL. V. 


2 


< 


AITOKAAY¥IZ IQANNOY 


eae Perce ah | Asta ‘ ἈΡΧῊ , 
II. καὶ τὸ θηρίον ὃ ἦν, καὶ οὐκ ἔστι, καὶ αὐτὸς | dydods 


k Iu and after them, so Dan. vii. 8, 24. 


453 


9. 9 ὧδε ὁ νοῦς d xiii. 18 
Cf. Sib. 
τ, ii. 18, 

‘Pans 
επτα- 
λόφοιο. 
Cf iii. 8 
and xii. 6 
also 1 
Kings 
xiii, 25 
(LXX). 
vi. II. 

Ὦ χχ. 3. 

i Cf. 2 Pet. 
m Dan. vii. 20, 24. 


ἑπτά εἰσιν - ot πέντε ἔπεσαν, 


4 


'dmddevavy ὑπάγει. 12. καὶ 


1 Ver. 8. 


prophecy of doom upon persecutors; it 
need not be a post-factum reference to 
D.’s murder in 96. He belonged to the 
seven, as he had been closely associated 
with the Imperial power already (Tac. 
Hist. iii. 84, iv. 2, 3; cf. Jos. Bell. iv. τι, 
4). The enigmatic and curt tone of the 
verse shows that either from prudence 
(‘‘some consideration towards the one 
who is beseems even a prophet,’? Momm- 
sen), Or more probably from pre-occupa- 
tion in the grim, ulterior figure of the 
Neronic antichrist, the prophet does not 
care to dwell minutely on the emperor’s 
personality as an incarnate Nero. He 
does not even allude to the suspicion, 
voiced by his contemporaries (4 Esd. xi. 
12) that Domitian had made away with 
Titus. His vision is strained, like that 
of his source, to the final and super- 
natural conflict; the Satanic messiah, 
the Beast who is to return from the 
abyss, bulks most prominently on the 
horizon. The absorbing interest of the 
oracle, even in its edited form, is escha- 
tological. John simply puts in a few 
words, as few as possible, to bring this 
Vespasianic source up to date, since the 
death of Titus had not been followed by 
the appearance of the Nero-antichrist. 
The latter is still and soon to come 
however! John thoroughly shares, 
though he expands and applies, the pre- 
diction of his source. The addition he 
makes to it in ver. II must on no account 
be taken as if it meant the substitution 
of ‘‘ Domitian= Nero redivivus” for the 
supernatural expectation of the latter. 
There is certainly some awkwardness in 
the juxtaposition of Domitian as a second 
Nero and of Nero redivivus, but this was 
inevitable under the circumstances. 

Vv. 12-18: the campaign of Nero and 
his vassal-kings against Rome, which is 
slain by an arrow feathered from her own 
wings. 

Vv. 12, 13. This political application 
of the ten horns probably means either 
the Parthian satraps of xvi. 12. reckoned 


9 


454 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


XVII. 


13. οὗτοι μίαν γνώμην ἔχουσι, kal Thy δύναμιν 


” - 
b= Ἐπ: οὕπω " ἔλαβον, ἀλλ᾽ ἐξουσίαν ὡς " βασιλεῖς μίαν ὥραν λαμβάνουσι 
perfec 
Burton, Ber τοῦ θηρίου. 
52. a A , , 
o Like καὶ ἐξουσίαν αὐτῶν τῷ θηρίῳ διδόασιν. 
Sargon's ae ae Aires, x 
allies, 14. ὃ οὗτοι μετὰ τοῦ ἀρνίου πολεμήσουσι, 
Isa. x. 8 
(cf. xxiii. καὶ TO ἀρνίον νικήσει αὐτούς, 
δ). , 
p Cf.on xiv. ὅτι *Kuptos κυρίων ἐστὶ καὶ βασιλεὺς βασιλέων---- 
ae " " 
q See on καὶ ot μετ᾽ αὐτοῦ " κλητοὶ καὶ * ἐκλεκτοὶ καὶ πιστοί. 
Xix. 16; 
Deut: ὦ, 15. kat λέγει μοι, “Τὰ 


TES; 


λ Ν a ” λ 9. 4 ‘x €6 ‘ ~ 
cxxxvi. 9, λαοὶ καὶ ὄχλοι εἰσὶν Kat ἔθνη καὶ γλῶσσαι. 


"ὕδατα ἃ εἶδες, οὗ ἡ πόρνη κάθηται, 


16. καὶ τὰ δέκα 


Dan. ii. ΄, a 5 Ν 5 Η a , 8 4 ‘ 

37,47,2 κέρατα ἃ εἶδες Kat τὸ θηρίον οὗτοι μισήσουσι τὴν πόρνην, καὶ 

acc. 

xiii. 4, ἠρημωμένην ποιήσουσιν αὐτὴν Kal ᾿ γυμνήν, Kal τὰς “σάρκας 

ass ~ , 

Eni 4, αὐτῆς " φάγονται, καὶ αὐτὴν “Katakatcouow ἐν πυρί. 17. ὃ yap 
τος Pet. θεὸς ἔδωκεν εἰς τὰς καρδίας αὐτῶν ποιῆσαι τὴν γνώμην αὐτοῦ, 
BOVE: τ. x = ἢ , ‘ Ν᾿ κ᾿ , 9. α a 
t Cj. Ezek, καὶ "ποιῆσαι μίαν γνώμην, καὶ δοῦναι τὴν βασιλείαν αὐτῶν τῷ 

Xvi. 37-39, 

etc. 


u Plur. = fleshy parts of body, 2 Kings ix. 36, etc. 


(Hellenistic fut. of ἐσθίω) cf. Win. § 13, 6 
x Cf. Cic. pro Milone, 33. 


in round numbers, who occupied a royal 
position in the estimation of the East 
(so, eg., Eichhorn, de Wette, Bleek, 
Bousset, Scott, J. Weiss, Baljon, Well- 
hausen), or (‘‘ chefs d’armée,”’ Havet) 
the governors of the (ten senatorial) pro- 
vinces, holding office for (μίαν ὥραν) one 
year (so Ewald, Hilg., Hausrath, Momm- 
sen, B. Weiss, Hirscht, Briggs, Selwyn, 
B. W. Henderson [‘‘the number may be 
derived from Daniel. In any case it is 
a round number, and the seer did not go 
round counting the number of the Roman 
provinces ”’]), unless it is to be left asa 
vague description of the allies (Weizs., 
Holtzm., Swete). Philo (de leg. ad 
Caium xxxiv.) notes the facilities pos- 
sessed by proconsuls for starting revolu- 
tions, especially if they commanded 
powerful armies such as those stationed 
on the Euphrates to protect Syria. 

Ver. 14. An abrupt and proleptic allu- 
sion to xix. 11-21; the Christian messiah 
is the true King of kings (a side reference 
to the well-known Parthian title). This 
is the first time that John brings the 
Lamb on the scene of earthly action. He 
now appears at the side, or rather at the 
head, of his followers in the final crisis, 
not in a struggle preceding the sack of 
Rome. He and Satan (as represented 
by the empire) are the real protagonists. 
Note the share assigned to the faithful 
in this victory (after ii. 26, 27). The 
war fought on their behalf by the Lamb 
is their fight also (cf. on xix. 14); i 


v xix. 18, Ps. xxvii. 3, Mic. iii. 2f.; on form 
w Xviii. 8, 18, Lev. xxi. 9, Nah. iii. 15 


success rests on the divine election and 
their corresponding loyalty (cf. xii. 11, 
xiii. 8; a Zoroastrian parallel in Yasht 
xiii. 48 ; the favourite description of the 
saints in Enoch as ‘‘ chosen [and] right 
eous”’; and Passio Perpetuae, xxi., “ὁ 
fortissimi martyres! o were uocati et 
electi in gloriam Domini nostri Jesu 
Christi”). The redeeming power of 
Christ, together with the adoration which 
he alone can rightfully claim, make his 
cause more than equal to the empires 
of the world (cf. the thought of Isa. 
1111. 12). 

Ver. 15. The woman impiously rivais 
God (κύριος ἐπὶ ὑδάτων πολλῶν, Ps. xxix. 
3, cf. το]).---ὄχλοι is substituted for the 
more common φυλαί, perhaps with an 
allusion (after Ezek. xvi. 15, 25, 31) to 
Rome’s imperial rapacity. 

Ver. 16. Rome perishes at the hands 
of Nero and his ruthless allies—a belief 
loudly echoed in the Talmud. In Sib. 
Or. iv. 145, 350 f. the East then and 
thus regains the treasures of which the 
Oriental provinces had been despoiled.— 
γυμνήν ... πυρί, the doom of a Semitic 
harlot (Ezek. xxiii. 45 f., xxviii. 17, 18). 
But no details of the disaster are given. 

Ver. t7. The remarkable unanimity 
and obedience of the usurping vassals, 
which welds them into an avenging in- 
strument, ¢an only be explained on super- 
natural διουπάς. A divine overruling 
controls all political movements (cf. xi. 
2, xiii 5, 2), according to the determia- 


13—18. 


θηρίῳ, ἄχρι " τελεσθήσονται οἱ λόγοι τοῦ θεοῦ. 
ἣν εἶδες ἔστιν ἡ πόλις ἡ "μεγάλη, ἡ 


βασιλέων τῆς yas.” 


ism of apocalyptic tradition (Baldens- 
perger, 58 f.). The irony of the situa- 
tion is that the tools of providence are 
destroyed, after they have unconsciously 
served their purpose (as in Isa. x. 12 f.). 
The Imperial power, hitherto the usual 
support of Rome, is to prove her deadly 
foe; John’s stern philosophy is that one 
partner in this hateful union is employed 
to ruin the other. Not long before this 
prophecy appeared, Vitellius and Ves- 
pasian in the person of their partisans 
had ravaged Rome in the near future 
Nero’s allies were to fight, like Corio- 
lanus, against their ‘‘cankered country, 
with the spleen of all the under-fiends ”’. 
—ptav κιτιλ. The same tradition, on a 
simpler scale, appears in 4 Esd. xiii. 33, 
34 where, at the revelation of God’s Son, 
‘“every man shall leave his own land 
and their battles against one another; 
and a countless multitude shall assemble 
together, desiring to come and fight 
against him”. The dualism of God and 
Satan is not absolute; even the latter’s 
rianceuvres are made to subserve some 
providential design. 

Ver. 18. The dramatic climax of the 
oracle: the great harlot is—Rome, 
domina Roma, the pride and queen of 
the world! Cf. Spenser’s Ruines of 
Rome, 360 f. (‘“Rome was th’ whole 
world, and al the world was Rome ”’). 
For the probable position of xix. 9 b-10 
at this point in the original form of the 
Apocalypse, see below (ad loc.). 

After a prelude on the doom of this 
second and western Babylon (xviii. 1-3) 
two sublime songs follow: one of 
triumph in heaven (4-8) one of wailing 
on earth (9 f.). Both are modelled in 
semi-strophic style upon the earlier 
taunt-songs (cf. Introd. § 4) over Tyre 
and Babylon (cf. also Apoc. Bar. Ixxxii. 
3-9). But the severe invective against 
Rome reveals the shuddering impression 
which this marvel and mistress of the 
world made upon the conscience of her 
provincial subjects, Jewish or Christian. 
They were half fascinated, even as they 
felt repelled, by the sight of her gran- 
deur. This magnificent doom song (9 f.) 
like that of Apoc. Bar. xii. (cf. xiii.), 
however, celebrates her downfall, partly 
on grounds which might be justified 
from contemporary pagan authors (cf. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ I[QANNOY 


455 


‘ 

18. καὶ ἡ yuvipyx.7. 

Ζ xvi. 19, 
XViil. 10, 
Verg. 
Eclog. 

i. 19, 24. 

a Ps. ii. 2, lxxxix. 28. 


” , 329% - 
ἔχουσα βασιλείαν ἐπὶ τῶν 


Renan’s Apétres, ch. xvii.). Vv. 24 (note 
the sudden change from σοί to αὐτῇ) and 
20 (in whole or part) are Christian edi- 
torial insertions, (a) either by some scribe 
or editor after the Apocalypse was com- 
pleted, or (b) by John himself in an 
earlier source (Jewish or from his own 
hand). The presence of a special source 
is suggested by e.g., the unexampled use 
of ovat (cf. on ver. 16, and Oxyrh. Frag- 
ment of Uncan. Gospel, 31), the large 
number of ἅπαξ εὑρημένα (στρήν. 3, 
διπλόω 6, διπλόος, cf. 1 Tim. v. 17, 
otTpyy. 7 and g, σιρικοῦ, ἐλεφ.,σιδήρου, 
μαρμάρου and θύϊνον in 12, κινν.» 
ἄμωμον, σεμίδ., ῥεδῶν, and σωμάτων, 
[in this sense] in 13, ἀπώλετο (14), ἐργά- 
ἵονται [in this sense in Apoc.] in 17, 
τιμ. το, Spe. 21, pove., σαλπιστῶν, 
κιθαρῳδῶν fonly in xiv. 2] 22, ὀπώρα and 
λιπαρά, 14) andrare terms, for which the 
special character of the contents can 
hardly account. Differences of outlook 
also emerge; ¢.g., xviii. g f. is out of line 
with xvii. 17 and xvi. 13 f., xviii. 1-3 
(Rome long desolate) hardly tallies with 
xviii. g f. (ruins still smouldering, cf. xix. 
3), and the kings of xviii. 9, 10 lament, 
whereas in xvil. 16 they attack, Rome. 
These inconsistencies (Schén, Schmie- 
del) might in part be set down to the 
free poetic movement of the writer’s 
imagination, working in dramatic style 
and oblivious of matter-of-fact incon- 
gruities like the sauve qui peut of 4; 
just as the lack of any allusion to the 
Imperial cultus, the Lamb, or the martyrs 
(exc. 20 and 24) does not necessarily de- 
note a Jewish origin. But the cumula- 
tive effect of these features points to 20 
and 24 as insertions by John in a Jewish 
(cf. e.g., the special emphasis on the 
trader’s point of view, 11-17) Vespasianic 
source which originally formed a pendant 
to that underlying xvii. (so variously in 
detail but agreeing on a source, probably 
Jewish—Sabatier, Rauch, Spitta, Wey- 
land, Bousset, J. Weiss, Schmidt, Bal- 
jon, Pfleid., Wellhausen, von Soden, de 
Faye, Calmes). The original breathed 
the indignant spirit of a Jewish apo- 
calyptist against the proud empire which 
had won a temporary triumph over the 
city and people of God. John applies it 
to the Rome which was also responsible 
for the persecutions. The tone of it 


456 ATIOKAAYVIZ LQANNOY XVILL. 
gee ἐν 1} τ a Mera ταῦτα εἶδον ἄλχον Ἤν καταβαίνοντα 
fy Ἧι ps sila exniae isp Hayenty cal καὶ ἡ γῆ ἐφωτίσθη ° ἐκ 
pet, THIS δόξης αὐτοῦ. 2. καὶ ἔκραξεν ἐν ἰσχυρᾷ φωνῇ λέγων, 
« ἄμα, a, hi Ἐπεσεν ° ἔπεσε Βαβυλὼν ἡ μεγάλη, 
13, χνΐ. καὶ ἐγένετο ‘ κατοικητήριον δαιμονίων, 
ἃ Οὐ Acts καὶ φυλακὴ παντὸς πνεύματος ἀκαθάρτου, 
ay em καὶ φυλακὴ παντὸς " ὀρνέου © ἀκαθάρτου καὶ μεμισημένου ᾿ 
εὐ ΩΣ 3. ὅτι ἐκ τοῦ " οἴνου [τοῦ ᾿ θυμοῦ] τῆς πορνείας αὐτῆς πέπωκαν 
f From Isa. πάντα τὰ ἔθνη, 
contin καὶ οἱ βασιλεῖς τῆς γῆς μετ᾽ αὐτῆς " ἐπόρνευσαν, 
ἀδάμας oy καὶ οἱ ἔμποροι τῆς γῆς ἐκ τῆς “δυνάμεως τοῦ στρήνους. 
hoy αὐτῆς ἐπλούτησαν.᾽" 
Β ee 4. καὶ ἤκουσα ἄλλην φωνὴν ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ λέγουσαν, 
δε Deut. “««᾿ἘἘξέλθατε, ὁ "λαός μου, “ ἐξ αὐτῆς, 
A Shag. τὸ on μὴ ἐν ραν AT paige Bs 
ee καὶ “ ἐκ τῶν πληγῶν αὐτῆς ἵνα μὴ “ λάβητε 
Ws ee 7. δ. ὅτι * ἐκολλήθησαν αὐτῆς ai ἁμαρτίαι ἄχρι τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, 
geal! καὶ "ἐμνημόνευσεν ὃ Θεὸς TA ἀδικήματα αὐτῆς. 
Isa. xxiii. 


17, cf. Sib. Or. iii. 357£. 


26; from Isa. xlviii. 20, Jer. 1. 8, li. 45, etc. 
sharing her fate. q Cf. 1 Jo. iv. 13. 
peruenerunt (Bgl.). 5 xvi. 10. 


has been severely censured, as if it 
breathed a malignant orgy of revenge. 
‘“It does not matter whether Jewish or 
Christian materials are the ultimate 
source. He who takes delight in such 
fancies is no whit better than he who 
first invented them” (Wernle, p. 370). 
So far as this is true, it applies to xix. 
17-21 (or 14-20) rather than to xviii. 
But the criticism must be qualified; see 
notes on xviii. 7and 20. There is smoke 
in the flame, but a profound sense of 
moral indignation and retribution over- 
powers the mere vindictiveness of an un- 
patriotic fanatic who exults to see his 
oppressor humiliated. 

CuaPTER XVIII.—1-3: an angelic 
proclamation of Babylon’s fate (cf. xiv. 
8) in terms of Isa. xiii. 19-22, xxxiv. 14 
(demons of the desert, the Mazzikin of 
Jewish demonology, familiar to Baby- 
lonian magic), Jer. 1. 30, li. 37, Zeph. ti. 
15, etc. “Be of good cheer, O Jeru- 
salem. . . Miserable are the cities which 
thy children served, miserable is she who 
received thy sons. For as she rejoiced 
at thy fall and was glad at thy ruin, so 
shall she grieve at her own desolation. 
Yea I will take away her delight in her 
great crowds, and her vaunting shall 


1 Ezek. xxvii. 9-25. ν 
n Acts xviii. 10: collect. subst. hence plur. vb. cf. Jo. vi. 22, etc. 


τ Cf. Bar. i. 20. 


τῇ Jos. Ant. iii. 2, 4, = ‘‘money, means”. 
o Gen. xix. 14-15, Num. xvi. 
p By succumbing to her fascinations, and thus 
Suggested by Jer. li. 9. Accumulata 


turn to mourning. For fire from the 
Everlasting shall come upon her for a 
length of days, and for long shall she be 
inhabited by demons” (Bar. iv. 30-35). 
ἐκ «.t.A. “by (cf. ver. 19) the wealth of 
her wantonness”’ traders profited; i.e., 
by the enormous supplies which the 
capital required to satisfy her demands. 
(στρῆνος, -tdw from the New comedy 
and colloquial usage).—80o&a in ver. 1 
denotes the flashing brilliance which, 
according to the primitive collocation of 
life and light, accompanied the heavenly 
visitants to earth or the manifestation 
of a divine presence (xxi. II, 23, xxil. 
5); see the valuable paragraphs in 
Grill, pp. 259-271. 

Vv. 4-8. A song of exulting in heaven, 
addressed first to the faithful (ver. 4) and 
then (ver. 6) to the enemies who execute- 
God’s vengeance. 

Ver. 4. ἐξέλθατε (cf. Apoc. Bar. ii. 
1), which in the source referred to the 
Jewish community at Rome, is an artistic 
detail, retained like several in ch. xxi., 
although the historical meaning and ap- 
plication was lost in the new situation. 
Cf. the opening of Newman’s essay on. 
The Benedictine Centuries. 

Ver. 5. Plutarch (de sera wuéndict- 


I—9. ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 457 
6. "ἀπόδοτε αὐτῇ ὡς καὶ αὐτὴ ἀπέδωκεν, t Jer. κυ. 
a a 18, 1. 15 
καὶ διπλώσατε τὰ " διπλᾶ κατὰ τὰ ἔργα αὐτῆς " 29. Ps. 
shag by DT eis CXxxvii. 8. 
ἐν τῷ ποτηρίῳ “w ἐκέρασε, u Aisch., 
ως he Ag. : 
kepdoate αὐτῇ διπλοῦν. mney 
ly suffi- 
7. ὅσα ” ἐδόξασεν αὐτὴν καὶ " ἐστρηνίασε, cient," 
a , 59. αὶ x κ Isa. xl. 2, 
τοσοῦτον δότε αὐτῇ βασανισμὸν καὶ πένθος. Ixi. 7 ἢν, 
a a Zech. ix. 
"Ore ἐν TH καρδίᾳ αὐτῆς λέγει ἡ ὅτι “ Κάθημαι βασίλισσα, Hae 
καὶ χήρα οὐκ εἰμί καὶ πένθος οὐ μὴ ἴδω, ὡ ae in 
8. διὰ τοῦτο " ἐν μιᾷ ἡμέρᾳ " ἥξουσιν at πληγαὶ αὐτῆς, roe, 
“θάνατος καὶ πένθος Kat λιμός " ane cf. 
καὶ ἐν πυρὶ ὅ κατακαυθήσεται. ae pte 
“ 93᾽ Q , € x ε , eer 35, iv. 28. 
ὅτι "ἰσχυρὸς Κύριος ὁ Θεὸς 6 κρίνας αὐτήν. Ἐπ ΘΟ δ 
9. καὶ κλαύσουσιν καὶ κόψονται ἐπ᾽ * αὐτὴν οἱ © βασιλεῖς ΤῊ γῆ 8) cause” 
οἱ μετ᾽ αὐτῆς πορνεύσαντες καὶ στρηνιάσαντες, ὅταν βλέπωσι τὸν be 
z From 
Zeph. ii. 


15, of. Ovid., Met. vi. 193-195 (Niobe), 4 Esd. xi. 43. 
509-510, Hec. 285, Ovid, Fasti, ii. 235; cf. Job i. 13-19, Isa. x. 17. 
e Jer. 


c Cf. on vi. 8. d xvii. 16, Jer. 1. 31-32. 
XViii. 3; cf. Isa. xxiii. 5. 


15) is strong upon the solidarity of a 
city, which is liable to be punished at 
any time for past offences.—koAAGoOat 
(‘‘ Heaped up to the sky are her sins”) 
in the familiar sense of haerere=to 
follow close upon, or to cleave, the idea 
being that the mass of sins actually 
presses on the roof of heaven. The 
figure would be different if, as Holtzm. 
conjectures, KoAA. referred to the gluing 
together of the leaves composing a roll; 
the record of Rome’s sins would form so 
immense a volume that when unrolled it 
would reach the very heavens. “Et 
ascendit contumelia tua ad altissimum, 
et superbia tua ad fortem” (4 Esd. xi. 
43)- 
Ver. 6. The foes of Rome (unless 
ἀπόδοτε «.T.A., is a rhetorical apostro- 
phe) are invited to serve her with the 
retribution promised to the first Babylon 
(see reff.).—8:mddoate, cf. Oxyrh. Pap. 
iii. 520°. Ἔν τῷ ποτηρίῳ, κιτιλ. Cf. 
Apoc. Bar. xiii. 8 (to Romans), “‘ Ye who 
have drunk the strained wine, drink ye 
also of its dregs, the judgment of the 
Lofty One who has no respect of per- 
sons”. 

Ver. 7. It is probably at this point that 
the passage drifts over from the concep- 
tion of a voice heard (ver. 4) to that of 
direct utterance on the part of the pro- 
phet ; unless we are to suppose that the 
voice speaks till the close of ver. 20 (a 
similar instance in ch. xi.). Imperial 
Rome is imperious and insolent; haughty 


a Lucret. iii. 898-899, Eur. Herc. Fur. 
b Isa. xlvii. 9, Ezek. xxviii. 18. 


1. 34. f Diff. sense, i. 7. g xvii. 2, 


self-confidence is the sin of the second 
Babylon as of the first (see Isa. xlvii. 5, 
7, 8, imitated in this passage). Cf. (bef. 
80 A.D.) Sibyll. v. 173, where the impious 
and doomed city is upbraided for vaunt- 
ing “1 am by myself, and none shall 
overthrow me”. A similar charge of 
arrogance was brought by Ezekiel against 
the prince of Tyre (xxviii. 2 f., cf. xxvi., 
xxvil. throughout with the present pas- 
sage), and by the Jewish author of Apoc. 
Bar. xii. 3 against Rome. To the Semi- 
tic as to the Hellenic conscience, the fall 
of a haughty spirit always afforded moral 
relief. Nothing so shocked the ancient 
conscience as Overweening presumption 
in a state or an individual, which was 
certain ultimately to draw down upon it- 
se#f the crashing anger of heaven. 

Ver. 8. This drastic, ample punish- 
ment, though executed by subordinates 
in xvii. 16, 17, is here (as in 5, 20) re- 
garded on its divine side. God is strong, 
as well as guilty, glorious Rome (ver. Io, 
cf. on vi. 15); and his strength is mani- 
fested in the huge shocks of history, 
as well as in creation (iv. 11, v. 13). 
Rome’s proud disregard of all that was 
mutable in human conditions is visited 
with condign retribution. The prophet 
sees not a decline and fall but a sudden 
collapse (10, 16, 19). 

e Vv. g-20: the wailing on earth, by 
kings (9, 10), merchants (at length, r1- 
16), and seafaring men (17-20), imi- 
tated from the finer and more elaborate 


458 


h xiv. 11. 

i proximus 
ucalegon 
ardet? 

k Cf. on ver. 
16. 

1 xvi. 19. 

τὰ Ῥώμη 
robur 
(Bgl.); 
see 
below, 
ver. 21. 

n Isa. xvii. 
15: 
““merch- 


, 
“ἐρὐαΐ, οὐαί, 


AIIOKAAYY¥IZ ΙΏΑΝΝΟΥ 


XVII}. 


καπνὸν τῆς πυρώσεως αὐτῆς, το. ἀπὸ μακρόθεν ἑστηκότες διὰ τὸν 
i A A a 
φόβον τοῦ βασανισμοῦ αὐτῆς, λέγοντες, 
᾿ ἡ πόλις ἡ | μεγάλη, 
Βαβυλὼν ἡ πόλις ἡ "ἰσχυρά, 
4 a oo 3 ς , ” 
ὅτι μιᾷ ὥρᾳ ἦλθεν ἡ κρίσις σου. 
ὟΣ ae a a , . a 9. 9 δ εν 
II. καὶ οἱ " ἔμποροι τῆς γῆς κλαίουσι καὶ πενθοῦσιν ἐπ᾽ αὐτήν, 
ὅτι τὸν “ γόμον αὐτῶν οὐδεὶς ἀγοράζει οὐκ ἔτι" 12. γόμον χρυσοῦ 
καὶ ἀργύρου καὶ "λίθου ἢ τιμίου καὶ μαργαριτῶν καὶ βυσσίνου καὶ 


ς = , ft, A u Η 
ants," not? πορφύρας καὶ " σιρικοῦ καὶ " κοκκίνου ᾿ καὶ πᾶν ξύλον θύϊνον καὶ 


ἱπὴλ bs B Ἂ Η - 
“pedlars πᾶν σκεῦος ἐλεφάντινον καὶ πᾶν σκεῦος ἐκ ξύλου τιμιωτάτου και 
= A . Ny 

or huck- yaAKod καὶ σιδήρου Kal" μαρμάρου ᾿ 13. καὶ " κιννάμωμον καὶ ἄμω- 

εἰν “*XVI μον καὶ θυμιάματα καὶ “ μύρον καὶ "λίβανον καὶ οἶνον καὶ ἔλαιον 

ὃ Plots 8 καὶ σεμίδαλιν Kal σῖτον Kat κτήνη Kal πρόβατα καὶ “ἵππων καὶ 
(Ac. xxi. Ν i ἐξ 

3), ‘‘ wares”’. p See xvii. 4; cf. Plin., H. N. xxxvii. 12. q Friedlander, iii. 46f. r Tac., 

Ain. ii. 33, Verge, Georg. ii. 121. SXvil.4. ἀἔἋἔ =‘‘article”. Ὁ Fried., iii. 65-66. v Prov. 

vii. 17, Lucan, x. 165f., En. xxx. 3. w Jo. Xi. 2, Xii. 3, 5. x Matt. ii. 11. y Genitive 


depend. on youor (sc). 


passages in Ezek. xxvi.-xxviii, where 
kings (xxvi. 15-18), traders (very briefly 
and indirectly, xxvii. 36), and mariners 
(xxvii. 29-36) are all introduced in the 
lament over Tyre’s downfall. Contrast 
the joy of the three classes in ver. 20. 
A triple rhythm pervades (cf. 2, 3, 6, 8, 
14, 16, 19) but does not dominate this 
grim doom-song, somewhat after the well- 
known structure of the Semitic elegy. 
But the three laments are all character- 
istic. The kings are saddened by the 
swift overthrow of power (10), and the 
reverse of fortune; the merchants (11, 
16) by the loss of a profitable market, 
the mariners by the sudden blow inflicted 
on the shipping trade (ver. 19). 


Ver. 12. βυσσίνου (sc. ἱματίου) =‘ of 
fine linen’’; from βύσσος the delicate 
and expensive linen (or cotton) made out 
of Egyptian flax (Luke xvi. 10) ; σιρικοῦ 
= ‘silk,’ muslin, or gauze, chiefly used 
for women’s attire (Paus. iv. 110 ἢ); 
πᾶν ξύλον Ovivoy=‘‘all citron (citrus)- 
wood,” a fragrant, hard, dark brown, ex- 
pensive material for furniture, exported 
from N. Africa. Note the extensive 
range of Roman commerce to supply the 
needs of luxury (interea gustus elementa 
per omnia quaerunt, Juv. xi. 14; pearls, 
e.g., from Britain as well as Red Sea), 
also the various demands in order : orna- 
ments, wearing apparel, furniture, per- 
fumes (for personal and religious use), 
food, and social requirements. Wetse 
cites a rabbinic saying: decem partes 
diuitiarum sunt in mundo, nouem Romae 
et una in mundo uniuerso. 


? 


Ver. 13. ‘‘Cinnamon,”’ an aromatic 
spice (the inner bark of the tree) ex- 
ported from E. Asia and S. China; 
ἄμωμον, aromatic balsam for the hair, 
made from the seeds of some Eastern 
shrub (Verg. Ecl. iv. 25, ‘‘assyrium uolgo 
nascetur amomum; from Harran, Jos. 
Ant. xx. 2, 2)—for the form, cf. Levy’s 
die Semit. Fremdworter im Griech. (1895), 
P- 37; θυμιάματα, “incense,” in its in- 
gredients of aromatic spices; λίβανον -- 
‘*frankincense,” a fragrant gum-resin 
exported from S. Arabia (Isa. lx. 6, Jer. 
vi. 20); enormous quantities of perfume 
were employed by the Romans, chiefly in 
the care of the body, but also to mix 
with wine at their banquets (e.g., Juv. 
vi. 303, etc.; E. Bi. 5320); σεμίδαλιν -- 
“fine flour,’’ wheaten meal (LXX for 


M30, of. Deut. xxxti. 14; Ps. Ixxxi. 
16) of the choicest kind; wine, flour, 
and incense were all used in sacrifices. 
pedov, a Gallic word = four - wheeled 
“‘carriages’’ used by the well-to-do 
(cf. Jerome on Isa. Ixvi.). σωμάτων -- 
‘‘slaves” (later Greek, dropping the 
qualifying adj. δούλων or οἰκετικῶν, cf. 
Deissm. 160, Dittenberger’s Sylloge,? 
845, etc.). Kat ψυχὰς (reverting awk- 
wardly to accus.) ἀνθρώπων -- “' and souls 
of men”’ (from Ezek. xxvii. 13, “‘ they 
traded the persons of men for thy mer- 
chandise’’: ἐνεπορεύοντό σοι ἐν ψυχαῖς 
ἀνθρώπων, LXX, cf. 1 Chron. ν. 21). 
The double expression is strange. If 
καὶ is not to be taken as ‘‘ even,”’ identi- 
fying both, we must suppose that some 
distinction is intended, and that of the 


10---20, 


A ‘4 
ῥεδῶν καὶ ἡ σωμάτων καὶ ψυχὰς ἀνθρώπων. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


459 


15. οἱ ἔμποροι " τούτων z (LXX), 


οἱ πλουτήσαντες ἀπ᾽ αὐτῆς, ἀπὸ μακρόθεν " στήσονται διὰ τὸν φόβον vee 29, 

τοῦ βασανισμοῦ αὐτῆς κλαίοντες Kal πενθοῦντες, τό. λέγοντες, a Ὡς 
““Οὐαί, οὐαί, " ἡ πόλις ἡ μεγάλη, vila, 
ἡ περιβεβλημένη * βύσσινον καὶ πορφυροῦν Kal κόκκινον, Take. 


καὶ e € , > , ‘ ty 6 , ‘ , τ 2 
ι κεχρυσωμένη ἐν χρυσίῳ καὶ ᾿λιθῳ τιμίῳ καὶ μαργαρίτῃ a i.e. 


i. 10, 


o fal - A ” Wares 
ὅτι μιᾷ ὥρᾳ ἠρημώθη 6 τοσοῦτος πλοῦτος. men- 
‘ mee ok ι a ‘ tioned in 
17. "kat πᾶς “κυβερνήτης Kal πᾶς 6 ἐπὶ movtov! πλέων καὶ 14-15, 


Ver. 10, 


ναῦται καὶ ὅσοι τὴν θάλασσαν ἐργάζονται, ἀπὸ μακρόθεν ' ἔστη- ἢ τ 


‘ μι , A a ~ , > ~ 
σαν 18. καὶ ἔκραξαν βλέποντες τὸν καπνὸν τῆς πυρώσεως αὐτῆς, δ᾿ 
ame 


λέγοντες, * “ 


a κ᾿ - ᾿ τὰ 
χοῦν ἐπὶ τὰς κεφαλὰς αὐτῶν καὶ ἔκραξαν κλαίοντες καὶ πενθοῦντες, 


λέγοντες, 


““Οὐαΐ, οὐαί, ἡ πόλις ἡ μεγάλη, 


> 2 


XXVvii. 30- 


Nom. for 


’ , a a ? 
Tis ὁμοία τῇ πόλει TH μεγάλῃ; 19. Kat ' ἔβαλον “ YOM: for 


οὐαί 
(accus. 
Vill. 13, 
xii. 12), 
cf. το, 19. 
Here only 


ἐν y “ ἐπλούτησαν πάντες οἱ ἔχοντες τὰ πλοῖα ἐν τῇ θαλάσσῃ Z in Apoc, 


ἐκ τῆς " τιμιότητος αὐτῆς, 
ὅτι μιᾷ ὥρᾳ ἠρημώθη." 


20. “Εὐφραίνου ἐπ᾽ αὐτῇ, " οὐρανέ, 
‘ a 
καὶ ot " ἅγιοι καὶ ot “ ἀπόστολοι καὶ οἱ προφῆται, 
, - ~ 
ὅτι ἔκρινεν ὁ Θεὸς " τὸ κρίμα ὑμῶν " ἐξ αὐτῆς. 


XXVii, II. 
1 From Ezek. xxvii. 30, (Heb.), Jos. vii. 6 (LXX). 
“‘her costly treasures"’ (see on ver. 3). 
p Xil. 12, cf. xvi. 8. 
cxix. 84. 


i Note change to aor. from future (9, 11, 15). 


Ver. 12, 
xix. 8, 14, 
(pecul. 
to Apoc. 
in N.T.). 

6 xvii. 4. 

f Ver. 12. 

g Isa. xxiii. 
14, Ezek. 
XXVii. 

27, 29. 

ah h Acts 

_. _k xiii. 4 (ironical contrast). 

m Ezek. xxvii. 33. n Abstr. for concrete, 


o Deut. xxxii. 43, Isa. xliv. 23, Ass. Mos. x. 10, 
q Only here and xxi. 14, in Joh. lit. 


Ir XVii. I, Xix. 2. S vi. 10, Ps. 


1 For the unexampled TONON (cf. Ac. xxvii. 2) read MOTON (Nestle, Theol. 
Ltzg., 18, 97, 274, Einfihr., 135, E. Tr. 168; so Baljon and Gwynn) which was 


apparently read in some form by Copt., Pr. (omnis super mare nauigans). 


A similar 


confusion occurs in Judith vi. 21, and conversely kata Movrov has supplanted κατα 


τοπον in Eus., H. E. iv. 15, 2. 


two σωμάτων is the more specific. Pro- 
stitutes, or female slaves, or gladiators, 
or even grooms and drivers (ἴπποι καὶ 
ἱππεῖς, Ezek. xxvii. 14) have been more 
or less convincingly suggested as its 
meaning. Slave-dealing (Friedlander, 
iii. 87 ἔ; Dobschiitz, 266-269) was a 
lucrative trade under the empire, with 
Delos as its centre, and Asiatic youths 
especially were in large demand as 
pages, musicians, and court-attendants. 
Thousands of captives, after the siege of 
Jerusalem, were sent into slavery by the 
Roman government; and early Chris- 
tians at this period (Clem. Rom. lv.) 
voluntarily went into slavery either as 
substitutes for others or ‘‘ that with the 
price got for themselves they might fur- 
nish others with food”. 

Ver. 17. ἐργάζονται «.7.A.=‘‘ whose 
business is on the sea’’. The passage 


reflects the importance of Rome especi- 
ally for the trade of the Levant. Pliny 
(H. N. vi. τοι, xii. 84) gives the large 
figures of Oriental imports and their 
cost, adding sarcastically tanti nobis 
deliciae et feminae constant (Friedlander, 
iii. 48-51). The regret of the mariners 
for the grandeur that was Rome passes 
rapidly into a sense of commercial loss. 
Ver. 20. This verse interrupts the 
sequence of 19 and 21 in which the ruin 
of Rome is illustrated by the dramatic 
action of the angel. The awkward shift 
from description to an apostrophe, and 
the evidently Christian tone of the cry, 
betray an editor’s hand. His object is 
to render explicit the moral reasons why 
Christians should delight in the downfail 
ofthe city. He writesin the same triple 
rhythm as the source, and his hand is to 
be seen in the whole verse not simply in 


XVIII. 


21. καὶ ἦρεν ets ἄγγελος ἰσχυρὸς λίθον ὡς μῦλον μέγαν καὶ 
“Οὕτως "ὁρμήματι βληθήσεται Βαβυλὼν ἡ μεγάλη πόλις, 


22. καὶ φωνὴ “' κιθαρῳδῶν καὶ μουσικῶν καὶ αὐλητῶν καὶ * σαλ- 


y Fr. Jer. xxv. 10 (Heb.), cf. Aen. i. gp. 


460 ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ ILQANNOY 
tv. 2; see 
above, zB λ = θάλ λέ 
ver.10. εβάαλεν EL ν ασσαν Λεγων 
u Neh. ix. smh γον 
Ὑχ ἃ 
Macc. iv. 
8 (cf. Isa. "kal od μὴ εὑρεθῇ ἔτι. 
XXViii. 2): Ὁ 
“with 
sudden in 
onset or πιστων 
impetus,” > a‘ > - 3 A ον 
suiting οὐ μὴ ἀκουσθῇ ἐν σοὶ ἔτι, 
action to Ry din ’ , , 
word. και πᾶς τεχνίτης πάσης τέχνης 
v Ezek. 2 8 ς a \ o>» 
xxvi. 21. οὐ μὴ εὑρεθῇ ἐν σοὶ ἔτι, 
w xiv. 2,158. 
ei ὦ καὶ φωνὴ 7 μύλου 
Eze > AY ἀ 64 2 \ om” 
XXVi. 13; ou μὴ ἀκουσθῇ ἐν σοὶ ETL, 
cf. 
Macc. iii. ᾿ 
45, Suet. Nevo, 40-41, Doms#t. 4. x Win. § 13, 4. 
Bar. ii. 22 f. 
Kat ot ἀπόστολοι. The voice from 


heaven is thus made to pass into a clos- 
ing apostrophe to heaven and its in- 
habitants (cf. xi. 18), imitated from Jer. 
li. 48 (Heb.). John seems to assume 
that all had a case against Rome as vic- 
tims of her cruelty, probably in the 
main as martyrs and_ confessors. 
‘* Apostles,” omitted in ver. 24, has here 
(asin ii. 2) its wider sense (otherwise 
xxi. 14), but it must include Peter and 
Paul (Zahn, Einleit. § 39, n. 4).---ὅτι 
x.t.A.=‘' for God has judged her with 
your judgment,” i.e., vindicated you 
(done you justice, given you your due) 
by lexacting vengeance upon her. She 
who once doomed you is now doomed 
herself (cf. xvi. 6).—etgpatvov. Cf. En. 
Ixii., where the kings and rulers con- 
demned by messiah to eternal torment 
are to be ‘‘a spectacle for the righteous 
and his elect; they will rejoice over 
them because the wrath of the Lord of 
spirits resteth upon them, and his sword 
is drunk with their blood’’; also Isa. 
xxx. 29, for the call to exult over a fallen 
oppressor. A Parisian workman, who 
was looking down at the corpse of Robes- 
pierre, was overheard to mutter, with 
relief, ‘‘ Oui, il ya un Dieu”’. 

Vv. 21-24: a rhythmic song of doom, 
introduced by a symbolic action partly 
imitated from Jer. li. 63, 64. 

Ver. 21. Rome’s fall will be irrevoc- 
able and sudden and violent, as a power- 
ful angel shows dramatically by seizing 
a huge boulder and flinging it into the 
sea. Cf. the analogous description of 
Babylon’s collapse in Sib. Or. v. 158, 
163, 174. The reiterated emphasis on 
Roman luxury is notable. Later litera- 
ture, as Friedlander observes (iii. 9-17), 


tended to a conventional exaggeration 
of the luxurious civilisation under the 
Empire; judged by modern standards, 
at any rate, it was not particularly ex- 
travagant. This denunciation of wealth 
and ease, however, is apposite in a 
source which reflects the age of Nero, 
since it was under Nero, rather than 
under Vespasian or Domitian, that 
Roman luxury during the first century of 
our era reached its zenith. The oracle 
breathes the scorn felt by simple provin- 
cials for the capital’s wanton splendour, 
and indeed for the sins of a pleasure- 
loving civilisation. But it is religious 
poetry, not a prose transcript of the 
contemporary commercial situation. 
Cf. Dill’s Roman Society, pp. 32 f., 66 f. 

Ver. 22. μουσικῶν “minstrels or 
musicians’? (1 Macc. ix. 41); the oc- 
currence of the generic term among the 
specific is certainly awkward and would 
favour the rendering “‘ singers” (Bengel, 
Holtzm.) in almost any other book than 
this. On these musical epithets see 
Friedlander, iii. 238 f.; the impulses to 
instrumental music at Rome during this 
period came mainly from Alexandria. 
For coins stamped with Nero as harpist 
see Suet. Nero, xxv. φωνὴ μύλον, the 
daily accompaniment of Oriental life. 
The sound of the mill meant habitation, 
but in the desolation of Rome no more 
pleasant stir of mirth or business would 
be heard (Isa. xlvii. 5). The fanatic 
Jesus, son of Ananus, who howled dur- 
ing the siege of Jerusalem and for four 
years previously (Jos. Bell. vi. 5, 3) ‘‘ woe 
to Jerusalem,’’ denounced upon her ‘“‘a 
voice from the east, a voice from the 
west, a voice from the four winds, a 
voice against Jerusalem and the temple. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


2I—24. 46 I 
23. καὶ φῶς “λύχνου z viii. 12. 
a Jer. vii. 
οὐ μὴ φάνῃ ἐν σοὶ ἔτι, ag 9, 
XXXxiii. τας 
καὶ φωνὴ 7 νυμφίου καὶ "νύμφης b Jer. xivii. 
~ Io, = 
οὐ μὴ ἀκουσθῇ ἐν σοὶ ἔτι " “ἴῃς ripe 
" ἊΣ Ξ fruit " 
14. καὶ ἡ " ὀπώρα σου τῆς ἐπιθυμίας τῆς " ψυχῆς alae 
ἀπῆλθεν ἀπὸ σοῦ, Beet 
καὶ πάντα τὰ “ λιπαρὰ καὶ τὰ "λαμπρὰ nee 
f> , a A c Ch. Win ’ 
ἀπώλετο ἀπὸ σοῦ, § 22, 185, 
καὶ obkéte! οὐ μὴ αὐτὰ εὑρήσουσιν. cast, 
2 sé hi¢ » , > at “- - a thid, § 30, 
3. " ὅτι “" Ob ἔμποροι σου ἦσαν ol ᾿ μεγιστᾶνες τῆς γῆς, 19g." 
ἌΝ , Bry a 
ὅτι ἐν TH “ φαρμακίᾳ cou ἐπλανήθησαν πάντα τὰ ἔθνη. pa ca 
24. ' καὶ ἐν αὐτῇ “᾿ αἷμα προφητῶν καὶ ἁγίων εὑρέθη, ἡ iy 
Α - > , - ~ ~ ” 1 d); 
ντων TOV ἐσφαγμένων ἐπὶ T ὃ pond 
καὶ πά φ ὟΝ oo) alae ns Isa, xxx. 
᾿ ὃ - A Nt δὲ 23, Neh. 
ix. 35. e “ All things rich and radiant,” cf. Jas. ii. 2-3. f Ps. cxli. 5 Did. xvi. 5. Only here 
in Apoc. g From Ezek. xxvii. 21, Isa. xxiii. 8. ἢ Predic. with article, Win. § 18, 8¢. 
vi. 15. k ix. 21, Isa. xlvii. 9-12, Nah. iii. 4. 1 xvi. 6; cf. Isa. xxvi. 21, Job xvi. 18. τὴ xvii. 


8, Ezek. xxiv.7-9. On sing. here and xvi. 12 (v.1, 


atwara), cf. Win. § 27. 4c. 


1« Possibly S. [ovxert avta βλεψεις και avra] here preserves the true text, and 
the rest” [ἐ.6.») αὐτὰ ευρησουσι = SACP, vg., Syr., evpns = Q, min., ευρησεις = 
I, 37, 96, etc., avra after evp. And.] “have lost the words by homoioteleuton” 


(Gwynn).—Here between the last ert and 


the first ort of 23 is the original piace of 


ver. 14 (so Beza, Vitringa, Volkmar, Baljon, Weiss, and Konnecke) which got into 
its canonical position between 13 and 15 owing to the error of some early copyist, 


-whose eye confused ort ἐβμποροι σον with 


.a voice against bridegrooms and brides, 
and a voice against the whole people ”’. 

Ver. 23. Contrast the εὑρέθη of 24 
-with the εὑρήσουσιν of ver. 14 which in 
its canonical position is an erratic boulder. 
φαρμακίᾳ, primarily in the figurative 
O.T. sense already noticed (harlotry and 
‘magic spells, as in Yasna ix. 32). But 
a literal allusion is not to be excluded, 
in view of the antipathy felt by pious 
Jews and early Christians to magic and 
~sorcery. As Rome represented the ex- 
isting authorities under whose aegis 
these black arts managed to flourish, and 
as they were generally bound up with 
religion, it would not be unnatural to 
charge the Empire with promoting sor- 
.cery (Weinel 10).—émAav. “ Commerce, 
as having regard to purely worldly in- 
‘terests, is called harlotry’’ [Cheyne on 
Isa. xxiii. 17]. Sorcery, witchcraft, 
** fornication,’” and the persecution of 
‘the righteous, are all manifestations of 
the lawlessness practised by Beliar 
working in men and kings (Asc. Isa. ii. 
4, 5). 

Ver. 24. Again, as at ver. 20, the 
change of style (here from an apostrophe 
“to a description) and spirit (xvii. 6) marks 
:an insertion by the final editor, unless 


OL ELTOPOL TOUTWY. 


the verse originally lay after ver. 3. The 
triple rhythm corresponds to that of ver. 
20. Rome has now succeeded Jerusalem 
(Matt. xxiii. 35, etc.) as the arch-enemy 
of the faithful. The climax of her ini- 
quities is couched in terms of the primi- 
tive Semitic idea (Gen. iv. ro) that 
exposed and discovered blood is a cry 
for vengeance [2 Macc. viii. 3 f.]; blood 
violently shed wails till it is appeased by 
the punishment of the murderers. By a 
natural hyperbole, Rome is held respon- 
sible for the murders, judicial and other- 
wise, of saints and prophets and the 
slain of Israel in general—substituted 
here for the ‘‘ apostles ’’ of ver. 20, prob- 
ably to include the Jews killed in the 
recent war as well as _ pre-Christian 
martyrs like the Maccabees of whom 
Augustine finely says: nondum quidem 
evat mortuus Christus, sed martyres eos 
fecit moriturus Christus (Heb. xi.-xii. 
1). Rome here is the last and worst ex- 
ponent of persecution. Her collapse is 
attributed to their blood drawing down 
God’s utter retribution. ‘‘ My blood be 
on the inhabitants of Chaldea, shall 
Jerusalem say ” (Jer. li. 35, imprecating 
successfully the divine revenge, vv. 36, 
49). As Chrysostom called psalm cix. a 


462 ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ITQANNOY Xie 
a Ver. 6, XIX. 1. Μετὰ ταῦτα ἤκουσα ὡς φωνὴν " μεγάλην ὄχλου πολλοῦ 
Vil. 9. 
b Cf. er.li. ἐν τῷ " οὐρανῷ “ λεγόντων, 
40. ε Py 
c Irreg. i Αλληλουϊά ᾿ 
appos. to τ Ρ 3 epg biG be 
collective ἃ ἡ σωτηρία καὶ ἡ δόξα καὶ ἡ δύναμις τοῦ ° θεοῦ ° ἡμῶν " 
ὄχλου. ao Ups x ,fo7 ef , renee 
dvil.to,xi. 2. ὅτι GAnOwai καὶ *Sikarar αἱ ‘ κρίσεις αὐτοῦ - 
15, Xii. 10 e 5 , . , 
(see ὅτι ἔκρινε τὴν πόρνην τὴν μεγάλην, 
note). 
e Cf. Joh. ᾿ 


ΧΧ. 17 Αρος, iii. 12, below 5-6. 


prophecy in the shape of a curse, this 
vehement, sensitive oracle against 
Rome’s insolence and cruelty may be 
termed a curse in the form of a pro- 
phecy. A similar idea underlay the 
view of certain pious people who, ac- 
cording to Josephus (cf. Eus. H. E. ii. 
23. 20-21), considered the fall of Jeru- 
salem a retribution for the foul murder 
of James the Just nearly ten years before. 

The doom-song is followed by an out- 
burst of celestial triumph (xix. 1-8) in 
answer to xviii. 20. The conclusion as 
well as the commencement of the victory 
(xii. 12 f.) is hymned in heaven. The 
stern, exultant anthem, which is morally 
superior to the delight voiced by In. 
xlvii. 4, forms an overture to the final 
movement of the Apocalypse, as well as 
(like vii. g f., xiv. 1-5) a relief to the 
sombre context. 8 6 is a prosaic edi- 
torial gloss, probably due to the liturgical 
use of the book, and the last clause of τὸ 
(ἣ yap ... προφητείας) might be the 
same (cf. 1 Cor. xv. 56), aS many editors 
think, were it not for the genuinely 
Johannine ring of the words. In any case 
it is an after-thought, probably (so 
Baljon,, Barth, etc.) added by the author 
himself, in order to bring out here 
what is brought out in xxii. 9 by the ex- 
plicit mention of the prophets, since éx. 
τ. μ- Ἰησοῦ alone would mean Christians 
in general. The presence of 9 b-10 here, 
however, is not motived as at xxii. 8, 9, 
where it comes in naturally at the finalé 
of the revelations and after a distinct 
allusion (xxii. 1) to the revealing angel. 
Here the angel of the second λέγει (at 
least) has not been mentioned since xvii. 
I, 7, 15, and no reason at all is given 
for the superstitious impulse to worship. 
The passage is certainly Johannine, but 
probably misplaced (like xviii. 14, etc.). 
Can it have originally lain at the end 
of xvii., where the hierophant angel is 
speaking (cf. also xvii. 17, words of God 
and xix. 9 δ) Such technical disloca- 
tions and derangements are common 
enough in primitive literature (cf. my 


f xv. 3; οἷ. on xvi. 7. 


Historical New Testament, pp. xxxix. 
676, 690). The passage must have been 
shifted to its present site either by acci- 
dent or more probably by a scribe who 
saw that the similar assurance in xxi. 5, 
xxii. 6 related primarily to future bliss 
rather than to judgment; perhaps he also 
took the first λέγει not as a divine saying 
(cf. xxi. 5) but as angelic (xxii. 6, cf. i. 
IO, II, 19, and note on xxii. ro), and 
sought to harmonise the same order as 
in xiv. 13 (command to write, beatitude, 
asseverance). Otherwise I-10 iS a unity 
as it stands. The change of situation in 
I-3, 4-10 does not prove any combination 
of sources; it is simply another of the 
inconsequences and transitions charac- 
teristic of the whole book. The mairiage- 
idea of 7, ὃ is a proleptic hint which 
is not developed till later (xxi.), while 
the supper (g) is only mentioned to be 
dropped—unless the grim vision of 17-21 
(for whichef. Gressmann’s Ursprung d. 
Isy.-jiid. Eschatologie, 136 f.) is meant 
to be a foil to it (so Sabatier and Schon). 

CuHaPpTeR XIX.—Ver. 1. Here only 
in N.T. (after the ruin of sinners, as Ps. 
civ. 35) the liturgical hallelujah of the 
psalter and synagogue worship occurs. 
In vv. I, 3, and 6 it stands as usual first, 
an invocation=“‘praise Jah’’; but in 
ver. 4 it is responsive, as in Pss. civ.-v., 
cxv.-cxvii. (the latter being sung at the 
passover; cf. Apoc. xix. 7). 

Ver. 2. ἔφθειρεν, as the first Babylon 
had been denounced for her depraving 
influence by Jeremiah (li.) xxviii. 25, 
τὸ ὄρος TO διεφθαρμένον τὸ διαφθεῖρον 
πᾶσαν τὴν γῆν. The impatient cry of 
vi. τὸ has now been answered. God 
“has avenged the blood (i.e., the murder) 
of his servants at her hand (7.e., on her),” 
the LXX rendering (e.g., in 2 Kings ix. 7, 
καὶ ἐκδικήσεις τὰ αἵματα τῶν δούλων. 
Κυρίον ἐκ χειρὸς “leLaBed) of the Heb. 
idiom J OF Ὁ) - ἴο exact punish- 
ment from a murderer. The idea is sub- 


stantially that of Ps. Sol. iv. 9, vili. 29- 
31. As ἄληθ. καὶ Sux. are a characteris- 


—— νῷ 


= 
ΝΜ." 


εϑ h» x ~ > a , ofa 
ἥτις “ ἔφθειρε τὴν γῆν ἐν τῇ πορνείᾳ αὐτῆς, 
Ἅ ἢ , ~ ~ a“ 
καὶ ᾿ἐξεδίκησε τὸ αἷμα τῶν δούλων αὐτοῦ ἐκ χειρὸς αὐτῆς. 


3. καὶ δεύτερον * εἴρηκαν, 
“᾿Αλληλουϊά - 


Wert “- A “- , 
καὶ ὃ “ καπνὸς αὐτῆς ἀναβαίνει εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας TOV αἰώνων. 


4. καὶ ᾿ 


λέγοντες, “ ““᾿Αμήν - ᾿Αλληλουϊά.᾽᾽ 
ἐξῆλθε λέγουσα, 


“4 Αἰνεῖτε τῷ θεῷ ? ἡμῶν πάντες οἱ " δοῦλοι αὐτοῦ, 
καὶ " οἱ φοβούμενοι αὐτὸν ‘ οἱ μικροὶ καὶ οἱ μεγάλοι. 
6. καὶ ἤκουσα ὡς φωνὴν “ ὄχλου πολλοῦ καὶ ὡς φωνὴν " ὑδάτων 
πολλῶν καὶ ὡς φωνὴν " βροντῶν ἰσχυρῶν, λέγοντες, 1 


“᾿Αλληλουϊά " 


ὅτι " ἐβασίλευσε Κύριος ὁ θεὸς ἡμῶν ὁ * παντοκράτωρ. 


Isa. xxxiv. 9-10. cf. Nah. i. 9. 
0 Vii. 12, xxii. 20, From Ps. evi. 48 (Heb.). 


1, Ps. Sol. ii. 47. 
Ezek. i. 24. 


λέγοντες (as iv. 1) Q, min., Ande, Tic. (WH marg., Al., Ws., 
AP, min., gig., Anda, Pr., Lach., Ti., Tr., WH, Bj., Sw.]. 


tically ample expression for ‘‘ equitable,” 
it is in the context rather than in the 
language of the passage (Ritschl, Rechtf. 
und Versohn. ii. 118, 119) that we must 
find the thought of God being shown to 
be the real and righteous Saviour of the 
saints by his infliction of punishment on 
their persecutors. 

Ver. 4. After the long interlude of 
judgments on the earth, the πρεσβύτεροι 
and ζῷα (incidentally mentioned in xi. 
16, xiv. 3) re-appear upon the scene, 
though for the last time, to take part in 
the chorus of praise over Rome’s ruin. 
The cradle-song of the future is the 
dirge of Rome. The drama now centres 
mainly round the city of God, and the 
earlier temple-scenery of the Apocalypse 
(iv.-xi. xv. 5-xvi. 17) passes almost wholly 
out of sight.—Auyv: the initial (and 
primitive) use of ἀμήν, social (e.g., 1 
Kings i. 36) as well as liturgical, which 
gravely assents to the preceding words 
of another speaker. 

Ver. 5. The O.T. expression servants 
of God implied (R. S. 69 f.) not simply 
membership in a community of which 
God is king, but special devotion to his 
service and worship. It was not associ- 
ated with any idea of ‘‘slavery to a- 
divine despot,’’ but was originally con- 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


n> c , ε δ , ‘ ‘ 
ἔπεσαν οἱ πρεσβύτεροι οἱ εἴκοσι τέσσαρες, Kal τὰ 
, ~ \ , - ~ a n , re - , 

τέσσαρα ζῷα, καὶ προσεκύνησαν τῷ θεῷ τῷ " καθημένῳ ἐπὶ τῷ θρόνῳ i a 


5. καὶ ᾿ φωνὴ ἀπὸ τοῦ θρόνου 


m v. 8, 14, on form cf. Helbing, 63-64. 

Ρ Of Christ (iii. 12, Joh. xx. 17)? 

13 (αἰνέσατε αὐτῷ, tr. of “ Hallelujah’); aiv. with dat. only here in N.T. 
s Ps. xxii. 23, Cxxxv. 20; see above xi. 18. 

w xi. 15, 17, Ps. xciii., xcv.-xcix. 


463 


g “" For that 
she” 
(i. 7, xii. 
13, e¢tc.). 
h xi. 18, 
XVlii. 23. 
i vi. 10, 
XViii. 20, 
Deut. 
XXXii. 43, 
Ps. Ixxix. 
10. 
oristic 
pf. (as v. 
7, Vil. 14. 
xix. 3), 
of past 
action 
with no 
thought 
of 
existing 
result 
(Burton, 
80, Blass, 


§ 59, 4). 

1 xiv. 11, 

XViii. 9, 

18, Ps. 

Civ. 35, 
Nn v. 13, Isa. vi. 1 
q Fr. Jer. xx. 
r Ps. cxxxiv. I, Cxxxv 


t xi. 18, u Ver.1. Vv xiv. 2, 


ΣᾺ. ΕΒ: 


Bs.) [λεγόντων 


fined in the main to royal and priestly 
families (cf. i. 5) which had a special in- 
terest in primitive religion and which 
were near to the god of the tribe or 
nation. Hence, in the broader and later 
sense of the term, the ‘servants of 
God” are all those who live in pious 
fear of him, 7.e., yielding him honour 
and obedience. John, pre-occupied with 
judgment, views the faith of the Lord as 
equivalent practically to his fear; unlike 
most early Christian writers, who (1 
Peter i. 17, 18, etc.) carefully bring for- 
ward the complementary element of love. 
Lowly confidence rather than warm inti- 
macy is this prophet’s ideal of the Chris- 
tian life towards God. See Did. iii., iv.; 
Barn. iv. 11; Herm. Mand. x. 1, xii. 4, 6. 

Ver. 6. S ingeniously but awkwardly 
punctuates after ‘‘4allelujah,”’ connecting 
ét.k.T.A., with the subsequent χαίρωμεν. 
—éBacirevoe κιτιλ. A sublimated ver- 
sion of the old watchword ΚΥΡΙΟΣ AY- 
ΤΟΣ ΒΑΣΙΛΕῪΣ HMQN which had been 
the rallying cry of pious Jews and especi- 
ally of the Pharisees (e.g., Ps. Sol. xvii. 
I, 2, 38, 51, ii. 34-36, v. 21, 22) during the 
conflict with Roman aggression. This 
divine epithalamium is the last song of 
praise in the Apocalypse. At this point 
also the writer reverts for a moment to 


464 ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ [QANNOY XIX. 
y Ps, ae ἡ. ᾿χαίρωμεν καὶ ἀγαλλιῶμεν, 
24; Cj. 
Mt. ν. 12. καὶ ἡ ϑώσομεν τὴν δόξαν atta: 
ZiXle 13... a i eae a ON 
aProleptic, ὅτι "ἦλθεν ὁ " γάμος τοῦ ἀρνίου, 
as xi. 18. sieeve A ἪΡ a eae ε , 
b xxi. 2, 9. καὶ ἡ “ γυνὴ αὐτοῦ * ἡτοίμασεν ἑαυτήν. 
c “ Bride” δὶ 
(Με. 1.59. 8. καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῇ ἵνα “ περιβάληται “ βύσσινον " λαμπρὸν 
ἃ Ver. 14, , CN Q , BY ξ ὃ , A eke ΕἸ , 73 
ΕΖ. xvi. καθαρόν [: ᾿ τὸ γὰρ βύσσινον τὰ ὅ δικαιώματα τῶν ἁγίων ἐστίν]. 
10. i a A 
e xv. 6, ΕἾ. g. καὶ " λέγει μοι, “*Tpdwov, ᾿ Μακάριοι οἱ εἰς τὸ δεῖπνον τοῦ 
Bar. v. I- a 
3 and γάμου τοῦ ἀρνίου “KexAnpévor.”” Kai λέγει μοι, ““' Οὗτοι οἱ λόγοι 
for conn. 
of light 


and right —2 Cor. vi. 14. 
XViii. 5. hi.e., the angel of xvii. τ; 

k Matt. xxii. 2-3; cf. Dalm. i. § 1, c. 50. 
Lk. xxi. 22. 


the Lamb, absent since xvii. 14 from his 
pages, and absent again till xxi. 9. 

Ver. 7. A proleptic allusion to the 
triumphant bliss as a marriage between 
the victorious messiah and his people or 
the new Jerusalem (cf. Volz, 331). The 
conception is primarily eschatological 
(Weinel, p. 137; cf. Mechilta on Exod. 
xix. 17) and is so employed here. The 
marriage-day of Christ and his church is 
the day of his second advent. This is 
the more intimate and tender aspect of 
the divine βασιλεία. But, as a tradi- 
tional feature of the Oriental myth (Jere- 
mias, 45 f.) was the postponement of the 
deity’s wedding until he returned from 
victory (i.e., after vanquishing the dark- 
ness and cold of the winter), the religious 
application turns first of all to the over- 
throw of messiah’s foes (xix. 11 f.).— 
ἀγαλλιῶμεν, act. as in τ Peter i. 8 (cf. 
Abbott, Diatessarica, 2,689). 

Ver. 8. ‘* Yea, she is (has been) per- 
mitted to put on” (for διδόναι ἵνα cf. 
ix. 5, Mark x. 37), epexegetic of ἥτοιμ.- 
ἑαυτήν (Isa. lxi. 10). ‘‘ Uides hic cultum 
gravem ut matronae, non pompaticum 
qualis meretricis ante (xvii. 4) descriptus,” 
Grot. In the following gloss (see above) 
the rare use of δικαιώματα (= ‘‘ righteous 
deeds”’) is paralleled by Bar. ii. το (τὰ Sux. 
τῶν πατέρων) and by an incidental em- 
ployment of the sing. in this sense by 
Paul (see on Kom. v. 18). Moral purity 
and activity, which are the conditions of 
future and final bliss, are (as in vii. 14, 
xiv. 4) defined as the outcome of human 
effort, although of course their existence 
must be referred to God (ἐδόθη), and their 
success to the aid of Christ (loc. cit.) ; 
see on i. 4-6. Ignatius similarly (Eph. 
x.) describes the saints as ‘‘ robed entirely 
in the commandments of Christ”. The 
connexion of thought is the same as that 
in Matt. xxi. 43, xxii. 2, 11-14. For 8 ὃ 


f Cf. Matt. xxii. 11-12, vii. 12, = xxii. 37 f. 
implied, asin Zech. i. 7, 9 (LXX)? 
1 xxi. 5, xxii. 6; cf. Dan. viii. 26, x. 1, xi. 2, xii. 7. Also 


g Contrast ἀδικ. 
i xiv. 13, Lk. xiv. 15. 


see the fontal passage from Sohar (cited 
by GfrGrer, ii. 184, 185): traditum est, 
quod opera bona ab homine hoc in mundo 
peracta, fiant ipsi uestis pretiosa in mundo 
illo. 

Ver.g. The saints are the Bride, but 
—by a confusion inevitable when the 
the two cognate figures, apocalyptic and 
synoptic (Matt. xxii. 2 f.), are combined 
—they are also the guests at the wed- 
ding. (The bliss of the next world is 
termed “the Banquet ” in rabbinic writ- 
ings, which interpret Exod. xxiv. II as 
though the sight of God were meat and 
drink to the beholders). Like the Greek 
πόλις, the church is composed of mem- 
bers who are ideally distinguishable from 
her, just as in En. xxxviii, 1 the congrega- 
tion of the righteous is equivalent to the 
new Jerusalem. With the idea of 7-9, 
cf. Pirke Aboth, iv. 23: This world is 
like a vestibule before the world to 
come ; prepare thyself at the vestibule 
that thou mayest be admitted into the 
τρικλίνιον.---ἀληθ. either ‘real ”’ as op- 
posed to fanciful and delusive revela- 
tions, or (if ἀληθ.--- ἀληθής) “ trustworthy 
words of God” (Dan. ii. 9) emphasis- 
ing the previous beatitude (like vat, λέγει 
τὸ πνεῦμα xiv. 13). Originally the 
words (see above) gravely corroborated 
all the preceding threats and promises 
(cf. xvii. 17), despite their occasionally 
strange and doubtful look. It is a com- 
mon reiteration in apoce. (cf. reff.), un- 
derlining as it were the solemn 
statements of a given passage. See, 4.9.» 
Herm. Vis, iii 4, ‘ that God’s name may 
be glorified, hath this been revealed to 
thee, for the sake of those who are of 
doubtful mind, questioning in their hearts 
whether this is so or not. Tell them it 
is all true, that there is nothing but 
truth in it, that all is sure and valid and 
founded’’. In Sanhed, Jerus. Rabbi Joc- 


7—II1. 


ἀληθινοὶ τοῦ θεοῦ 1 εἰσίν." 


AITIOKAAY¥IZ ITQANNOY 


405 


‘ » μι ~ ~ --: 
IO, καὶ ἔπεσα ἔμπροσθεν τῶν ποδῶν m (xxii. 9), 
> A “" Sm ia 
αὐτοῦ προσκυνῆσαι αὐτῷ - καὶ λέγει μοι, “ἡ Ὅρα " μή σύνδουλός 


, > ‘ -“ ~ A A 
σού εἰμι καὶ τῶν ἀδελφῶν σου τῶν " ἐχόντων τὴν μαρτυρίαν ᾿ἸΙησοῦ - 


SC. ποίη- 
ons, cf. 
Eur., 
Phen. 


a - , a a a 293. 
“ τῷ θεῷ προσκύνησον [- ἢ ἡ γὰρ μαρτυρία Ἰησοῦ ἐστὶ τὸ πνεῦμα τῆς n xiv 17. 


προφητείας]. 


ΝΥ δι 
II. καὶ εἶδον τὸν οὐρανὸν ἠνεῳγμένον, 


A 
καὶ ἰδοὺ “ ἵππος λευκός, 


o 1 Cor. 
xiv. 25. 

p 1 Cor. 
25, 

q Cf. vi. 2 
for 
language. 


- Bousset and Konnecke om. του θεου, but if the grammatical harshness of the 
text is an insuperable difficulty, the solution is to read (Beng., Lachm., Ws.) ot 


before αληθινοι (with A, 4, 48, S.). 


hanan declares, with reference to Dan. 
x. I, that a true word is one which has 
been already revealed by God to the 
council of the heavenly host. 

Ver, 10. Jewish eschatology at this 
point has much to say of the return of 
the ten tribes and the general restoration 
of Zion’s children from foreign lands 
but these speculations were naturally of 
no interest to the religious mind of the 
Christian prophet. As hitherto the 
command to write has come from Christ, 
the seer perhaps thinks that this injunc- 
tion also proceeds from a divine authority 
(Weiss), but his grateful and reverent 
attempt to pay divine homage to the 
angelus interpres (cf. xxii. 8) is severely 
rebuked. The author’s intention is to 
check any tendency to the angel-worship 
which—(whether a Jewish practice or 
not, cf. Clem. Alex. Strom. vi. 5, 41; 
Lightfoot on Col. ii. 18; and Lueken, 4 
f.).—had for some time fascinated the 
Asiatic churches here and there. If 
even a prophet need not bow to an 
angel, how much less an ordinary Chris- 
tian? A contemporary note of this 
polemic is heard in Asc. Isa. vii. 21 
(Christians) : et cecidi in faciem meam, 
ut eum (the angelus interpres, who con- 
ducts Isaiah through the heavens) 
adorarem, nec siuit me angelus, qui me 
instruebat, sed dixit mihi ne adores nec 
angelum nec thronum. In Asc. Isa. 
ii. τι the angelic cicerone even rebukes 
the seer for calling him Lord: οὐκ ἐγὼ 
κύριος, ἀλλὰ σύνδουλός σού εἰμι. The 
repetition of this scene (xxii. 8 4), due 
to the Oriental love of emphasis by 
reduplication, is significant in a book 
where angels swarm (cf. Dan. ii. 11).— 
H γὰρ κιτιλ., “for the testimony or 
witness of (i.2., borne by) Jesus is (i.¢., 
constitutes) the spirit of prophecy’’. 
This prose marginal comment (see 
above) specifically defines the brethren 


᾽ 


who hold the testimony of Jesus as pos- 
sessors of prophetic inspiration. The 
testimony of Jesus is practically equiva- 
lent to Jesus testifying (xxii. 20). It is the 
self-revelation of Jesus (according to i. 1, 
due ultimately to God) which moves 
the Christian prophets. He forms at 
once the impulse and subject of their 
utterances (cf. Ignat. Rom. viii. ; Eph. vi.). 
The motive and materials for genuine 
prophecy consist in a readiness to allow 
the spirit of Jesus to bring the truth of 
God before the mind and conscience (c/. 
iii. 14, 22). The gloss even connects in 
a certain way with τῷ θεῷ προσκύνησον. 
Since angelic and human inspiration 
alike spring from the divine witness of 
Jesus, therefore God alone, as its ulti- 
mate source, deserves the reverence of 
those whom that inspiration impresses. 
The prestige of the prophets lies in the 
fact that any one of them is, as Philo 
called Abraham, σύνδουλος τῶν ἀγγέλων. 
An angel can do no more than bear 
witness to Jesus. Furthermore, there is 
an implicit definition of the spirit of 
prophecy (xi. 7, etc.) in its final phase as 
a revelation of Jesus Christ. Even the 
O.T. prophetic books, with which the 
Apocalypse claims to rank, were inspired 
by the spirit of the pre-existent Christ 
(see on 1 Pet. i. rr; Barn. v. 6). But 
now, by an anti-Jewish and even anti- 
pagan touch, no oracular or prophetic 
inspiration is allowed to be genuine 
unless it concerns Jesus who is the 
Christ. Such is the triumphant defini- 
tion or rather manifesto of the new 
Christian prophecy. 

Vv. 11-21: a second vision of doom, 
on the Beast and his allies (in fulfil- 
ment of xii. 5). Their fate (17-21) 
follows a procession of the angelic 
troops (11-16, contrast ix. 16 f.). The 
connexion of this and the foregoing 
volume (7-9) is mediated by the idea tha: 


XIX. 


A 
ἐπ᾿ αὐτὸν "καλούμενος "πιστὸς καὶ 


466 ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 
r iii. 14. ὶ ὁ Ί 
che καὶ ὃ ΚΑΡηβεδν 
of Deut. "ἀληθινός, 
vii. 9, ᾿ ᾿ Ν᾿ 
πεν καὶ " ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ κρίνει καὶ πολεμεῖ " 
(Le ; ε ‘ > > “A ‘ 
cf. Ps. 12. ot δὲ " ὀφθαλμοὶ αὐτοῦ φλὸξ πυρός, 
Sol. xvii. 
4-5, and 


Isa. xlii. 3 (LX X). vi 
function of Semitic king (1 Sam. villi. 20). 


the marriage of the warrior-messiah (cf. 
En. lx. 2; 4 Esd. xii. 32, xill. 38; Apoc. 
Bar. xxxix., xl., Ixx.) cannot take place till 
he returns from victory (so in the mes- 
sianic psalm xlv.). Now that the preli- 
minary fhovements of the enemy (xvii. 
16, 17) are over, the holy war of xvil. 14 
begins, which is to end in a ghastly 
Armageddon. This passage and the 
subsequent oracle of xx. I-10 reproduce in 
part a messianic programme according to 
which the dolores Messiae (cf. Klausner: 
mess. Vorstellungen d. jiid. Volkes im 
Zeitalter der Tannaiten, 1904, 47 f, and 
Charles on Apoc. Bar. xxvii. 1) are fol- 
lowed by messiah’s royal advent on earth 
(here sketched in part from Sap.xviii. 4-25) 
to found a kingdom of the just (i,¢., Israel) 
who are raised for this purpose. Israel 
supplants Rome as the world- power 
(Bar. xxxix.). Her period of superiority 
opens with the rebuilding of Jerusalem 
and the temple, and closes with a crush- 
ing defeat of Gog and Magog, who are 
led by an incarnate villain (‘‘dux ulti- 
mus,” xl.), but are finally vanquished by 
the aid of the ten tribes who return to 
take part inthis campaign. Death and 
Satan then are annihilated, and eternal 
bliss ensues. Like Paul in τ Cor. xv. 
20 f., John modifies this scheme of tradi- 
tion freely for his own Christian ends. 
He introduces a realistic expansion of 
the messianic age into three periods: 
(a) a victory of messiah (mounted, like 
Vishnu, on a white horse for the last 
battle) and his ἅγιοι (cf. xiv. 20) over 
the beast, the false prophet, and the 
kings of the world, who—as already 
noted—turn their attention to the saints 
after crushing Rome (11-21); (δ) an un- 
disturbed reign of Christ and his martyrs 
(xx. 1-6), evidently in Palestine; (c) the 
final defeat of Gog and Magog, with 
Satan their instigator (xx. 7-10). There 
is little or nothing specifically Christian 
in all this section (except xx. 4-6, cf. 
xix. 13), but the general style betrays the 
author’s own hand, and there is no rea- 
son to suppose that a Jewish source in 
whole or part (so ¢.g., Vischer, Sabatier, 
de Faye, Weyland, Spitta, von Soden) 
underlies it. The sequence of the pas- 


t Cf. on xvi. 7, Dan. ii. 45, iii. 27f. (LXX). 
ν ii. 18. 


u Ps, xevi. 13: twofold 


sage with xvi. 13-16, 18-20 is due to a 
common cycle of tradition, rather than 
to any literary source (Schén). It is a 
homogeneous finalé written by the pro- 
phet, in terms of current eschatology, to 
round off the predictions at which he has 
already hinted. Moralising traits emerge 
amidst the realism, but it is impossible to 
be sure how far the whole passage (i.e., 
11-21) was intended to be figurative. 

Vy. 11-16. messiah and his troops or 
retinue: Jesus to the rescue (cf. Samson 
Agonistes, 1268 f.). The following de- 
scription of a semi-judicial, semi-military 
hero is painted from passages like Isa. 
xi. 3-5 (where messiah, instead of judg- 
ing by appearances, decides equitably: 
πατάξει γῆν τῷ λόγῳ τοῦ στόματος 
αὐτοῦ : his breath slays the wicked: his 
loins are girt δικαιοσύνῃ and ἀληθείᾳ), 
the theophany of Hab. iii., and the san- 
guinary picture of Yahveh returning in 
triumph from the carnage in Idumea 
(cf. ver. 13 with Isa. lxiii. 1-6). On the 
connexion of this celestial Rider with 
the Rider in 2 Macc. iii., cf. Nestle in 
Zeits. f. alt. Wiss. 1905, pp. 203f. 

Ver. rr. The military function of the 
messiah is known even to the philosophic 
Philo, who (de praem. et poen. chee | 
represents him incidentally as κα 
στραταρχῶν καὶ πολεμῶν ἔθνη. The 
victory of messiah over the earthly foes 
of God’s kingdom meant the triumph of 
the kingdom, according to Jewish and 
Jewish Christian hopes; but owing to 
the increased spiritualisation of the latter, 
this nationalistic tradition was laid side by 
side with the wider hope of an eternal, 
universal judgment upon dead and living. 
The latter was originally independent of 
the earlier view, which made the culmina- 
tion of providence for Israel consist in 
the earthly subjugation of her foes. The 
prophet John, by dividing God’s foes into 
the two classes of Rome and Rome’s de- 
stroyers, preserves the archaic tradition 
and also finds room for the Gog and 
Magog tradition later on. 

Ver. 12, διαδήματα πολλά, bec. he is 
king of kings (Ptolemy on entering An- 
tioch put two diadems on his head, that 
of Egypt and that of Asia.(t Macc. xi. 13); 





42—13. ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 467 
καὶ ἐπὶ τὴν κεφαλὴν αὐτοῦ ” διαδήματα ” πολλά’ w Contrast 
ad > x > δ ey Zul. 8, 
ἡ ἔχων 7 ὄνομα γεγραμμένον ὃ οὐδεὶς οἶδεν εἰ μὴ αὐτός - xiit. t, 
ἃ Σ y ἧς x Loosely 
13. καὶ * περιβεβλημένος ἱμάτιον βεβαμμένον | * αἵματι - resuming 
, » > A ε τῆς con- 
καὶ κέκληται τὸ ὄνομα αὐτοῦ, "“΄Ὃ AOTOC TOY OEOY.” struction 
of ver. 
Ὕ Cf. on ii. 17. z Dat. cf. Joh. xxi. 8. a Art. with pred. irreg. after ὄνομα (as vi. 8, viii. 21, etc.) 


| BeBappevov (AQ, min., Ar., edd.) is preferable to pepappevov (Hort, Swete)— 
the conjectural origin of the variants wepipepappevov (δ) eppapevov, ρεραντισ- 
pevov, etc.—which is probably a corruption of it or due to dittography with γεγραμ- 


μενον. 


cf. the ten golden diadems of royalty 
in ancient Egypt). Once crowned with 
thorns, Jesus is now invested with more 
than royal rank (cf. Barn. vii. 9, where 
Jesus, once accursed, is shown crowned). 
Eastern monarchs wore such royal in- 
signia when they went into battle (e.g., 2 
Sam. i. 10). Jesus has far more than the 
four (of a good name, of the law, of the 
high priesthood, of the divine kingdom, 
Targ. Jeius. on Deut. xxxiv.) 5 or three 
(omitting the first) which Jewish tradition 
assigned to Moses (see Pirke Aboth, iv. 
13, vi. 5; Joseph. Bell. i. 2, 8, prophetic, 
priestly, and royal honours). — ὄνομα 
κιτιλ., cf. Ep. Lugd., ‘““when Attalus 
was placed on the iron seat and the 
fumes rose from his burning body, he 
was asked, ‘What name has God?’ 
‘God,’ he answered, ‘has not a name as 
man has.” Contrast ὃ οὐδεὶς x.T.X., 
with Matt. xi. 27. The earlier words, 
πιστ. K. ἄληθ., are a description of the 
messiah’s character and function, rather 
than atitle. At this debit, which is the 
only event in the Apocalypse at all cor- 
responding to the second advent (i. 7), 
the messiah’s judicial power is practi- 
cally restricted to the external work of 
crushing the last pagan opposition to 
God’s cause on earth ; it becomes therefore 
almost military. The divine commandant 
of the saints is “" faithful and true,” as he 
loyally executes the divine purpose and 
‘thus exhibits fidelity to the interests of 
the faithful. The sense remains un- 
changed, whether the two adjectives are 
taken as synonyms, or ἄληθ. assigned its 
occasional meaning of ‘‘real’’, Evenin 
the latter case, to be real would mean to 
be trustworthy. 

Ver. 13. ‘‘ Dipped in blood”? (ἰ.6., the 
blood of his foes): from the ‘‘crimsoned 
garments”’ of Yahveh in Isa. Ixiii.; cf. 
also ver. 15 with “1 have trodden the 
wine-press. . . . Yea, I trod them in 
mine anger (κατεπάτησα αὐτοὺς ἐν θυμῷ 
pov), and trampled them in my fury,” 


etc. Add Targ. Palest. on Gen. xlix. σὰ, 
‘‘ How beauteous is the King Messiah! 
Binding his loins and going forth to war 
against them that hate him, he will slay 
kings with princes, and make the rivers 
red with the blood of their slain, and his 
hills white with the fat of their mighty 
ones, his garments will be dipped in 
blood, and he himself like the juice of the 
wine-press.”” The secret name denotes 
his superiority to all appeals ; it indicates 
that the awful and punitive vigour of his 
enterprise made him impervious to the 
invocations of men. This is no Logos 
who dwells among men to give light 
and life; it is a stern, militant, figure 
of vengeance attacking the rebellious. 
Hence his name is mysterious; for “‘ the 
identity, or at least the close connection 
between a thing and its name, not only 
makes the utterance of a holy name an 
invocation which insures the actual pre- 
sence of the deity invoked, it also makes 
the holy name too sacred for common 
use or even for use at all” (Jevons’ 
Introd. Hist. Relig. 361). The passage 
reflects certain phases of later messianic 
belief in Judaism, which had been tinged 
by the Babylonian myth of Marduk, 
Ea’s victorious son, to whom divine 
authority was entrusted. Marduk’s tri- 
umph was explained by Babylonian theo- 
logians as caused by the transference to 
him of the divine Name (so Michael, 
En. Ixix. 14). 13 6 may be a Johannine 
gloss upon the unknown name of ver. 12 
(cf. Phil. ii. 9, το), under the influence 
of passages like Heb. iv. 15, Sap. xviii. 
(‘‘ Thine all-powerful Logos leapt from 
heaven out of the royal throne, as a 
stern warrior into the midst of the 
doomed land, bearing the sharp sword of 
Thine unfeigned commandment”), and 
Enoch xc. 38 (cp. however Beer, ad loc.). 
--κέκληται, perf. of existing state, ‘ the 
past action of which it is the result being 
left out of thought’’ (Burton, 75). Ifthe 
above explanation of the mysterious name 


468 


b xvi. 14-16: 
c As in xiv. 


4? differ- ἵπποις λευκοῖς, 


ently xvii. 
14 (cf. 
Yasht 
xiii. 12- 
19 for 
heavenly 
aid of 
certain 
Fra- 
vashis), 
cf. Par. 
wate vi. 
884. 

d nce Oe 16. 

e Constr. , 
ad γεγράμμενον, 
sensum. 

f Ver. 8. 

g From 
Dan. ix. 25; see i. 16, ii. 12. 
10, 27f. i ii. 27, xii. 5. 
= “sword-belt ” (Spitta). 


rs. 


1A om. emt To ιματιον Kar (S. = “ 


thigh”). Wellh. conj. ἐπὶ tov ἱππον. 
be correct, the author’s idea was evidently 
forgotten or ignored by some later editor 
or copyist of the Johannine school, who 
inserted this gloss in order to clear up 
the obscure reference, and at the same 
time to bring forward the transcendent 
name widely appropriated by that school 
for Christ in a pacific and religious sense 
(so nearly all critical editors). In any 
case the two conceptions of the Apoca- 
lypse and the Fourth gospel have little 
or nothing in common except the word. 
But the introduction of this apparently 
illogical sequence between 12 and 13 
might be justified in part by Ε. B. ἢ. 
94, “1 am he that cometh forth, advanc- 
ing, whose name is unknown; I am 
Yesterday, and Seer of millions of years 
is my name’’. The application of such 
titles to Jesus certainly gives the impres- 
sion that these high, honourable predi- 
cates are ‘“‘not yet joined to his person 
with any intrinsic and essential unity” 
(Baur) ; they are rather due to the feeling 
that ‘‘Christ must have a position ade- 
quate to the great expectations concern- 
ing the last things, of which he is the 
chief subject’. But their introduction is 
due to the semi-Christianised messianic 
conceptions and the divine categories by 
which the writer is attempting to inter- 
pret his experience of Jesus. Backwards 
and forwards, as pre-existent and future, 
the redeemer is magnified for the pro- 
phet’s consciousness. 

Ver. 15. aités—The victory of the 
messiah is single-handed (“1 have trod- 
den the wine-press alone”) ; cf. on ver. 13, 
and Sap. xviii. 22, Ps. Sol. xvii. 24-27, 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΎΨΙΣ IOQANNOY 


καὶ ἐκ τοῦ στόματος αὐτοῦ ἐκπορεύεται 


1 
καὶ ἔχει ἐπὶ TO ἱμάτιον καὶ ἐπὶ τὸν 


ΧΙᾺ. 


4 s Ὁ , δλιν ~ > A ¢2 , Bee), Se 
14. καὶ τὰ " στρατεύματα τὰ ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ “ ἠκολούθει αὐτῷ ἐφ 


* ἐνδεδυμένοι * βύσσινον λευκὸν καὶ καθαρόν. 


* ῥομφαία ὀξεῖα, ἵνα. 


ἐν αὐτῇ " πατάξῃ τὰ ἔθνη " 
καὶ αὐτὸς ᾿ ποιμανεῖ αὐτοὺς ἐν ῥάβδῳ σιδηρᾷ " 
‘ > ἧς ee ES. λ Oar | a ον ~ a a a 
καὶ αὐτὸς πατεῖ “ τὴν ληνὸν " τοῦ οἴνου τοῦ θυμοῦ τῆς ὀργῆς 
τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ παντοκράτορος. 


m a > δι᾿ ἮΝ 
μηρον αὐτου ονομα. 


“πὶ BACIAEYC BACIAEQN ΚΑΙ KYPIOC KYPIQN”’. 


h Isa. xi. 4, (quoted Ps. Sol. xvii. 39), En. Ixii. 2, cf. 4 Esd. xiii. 
k xiv. 20, Jud. iii. 13. 
n Kup. κυρ. a Babylonian title of Marduk. 


τῇ ἅπ. Aey- N.1.; 


1 xiv. το, xvi. 19. 
xvii. 14, 1 Ti. vi. 15. 


written on garments which were on his: 
Cf. E. Bi., 2517. 


where the word of messiah’s mouth 15. 
the sole weapon of his victory (an 
Iranian touch as in S. B. E. iv. p. Ixxvii- 
f., the distinguishing excellence of Zoro- 
aster is that his chief weapon is spiritual, 
i.e., the word or prayer). This fine 
idea, taken originally from Isaiah, was re- 
produced, naturally in a more or less. 
realistic shape, by the rabbis who applied 
it to Moses at Exod. ii. τὶ (Clem. Alex. 
Stron. i. 23), and by apocalyptists (2 
Thess. ii. 8; Ap. Bar. xxxvi. f., liii. f.; 4 
Esd. x. 60 f., and here) who assigned an 
active role to the messiah in the latter 
days. The meaning of the sword-symbol 
is that ‘‘ the whole counsel of God is 
accomplished by Jesus as a stern judg- 
ment with resistless power’ (Baur). 
Thus the final rout of the devil, antici- 
pated in xii. 12, is carried out (i.) by the 
overthrow of his subordinates (mentioned 
in ch. xiii.) here, and then (ii.) by his 
own defeat (xx. το), although in finishing 
the torso of ch. xii. (Bousset) the pro- 
phet characteristically has recourse to 
materials drawn from very different cycles 
of current messianic tradition. 

Ver. 16. ‘And on his garment and 
(i.e., even) upon his thigh’’; on that 
part of the robe covering his thigh, he 
has a title of honour written. Some 
Greek statues appear to have had a 
name written thus upon the thigh (Cicero 
mentions one of Apollo marked in smal! 
silver letters, Verr. iv. 43). Messiah, 
like many of the Assyrian monarchs, 
bears a double name. King of kings, a 
Persian (Aisch. Pers@, 24; Ezra vii. 12) 
and Parthian title of royalty, which i= 


| 

14—20. ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 409 

17. Καὶ εἶδον “ ἕνα ἄγγελον ἑστῶτα ἐν τῷ ἡλίῳ - καὶ ἔκραξε φωνῇ ο nit 8 
μεγάλῃ λέγων πᾶσι τοῖς ἢ ὀρνέοις τοῖς πετομένοις ἐν μεσουρανήματι, a me 

a Ἕ ae — n 
“Δεῦτε συνάχθητε εἰς τὸ δεῖπνον τὸ μέγα τοῦ Θεοῦ, 18. Asc. Is. 
. aad , “ ᾿ , ἦν. 18. 
iva “φάγητε σάρκας βασιλέων καὶ σάρκας χιλιάρχων καὶ p xvii. 2 
. q xvii. 16. 


, > ~ 4 ~ ἐν ᾿ . 
σάρκας "ἰσχυρῶν καὶ σάρκας ἵππων Kal τῶν καθημένων ἐπ᾽ αὐτῶν καὶ τ Cf. on vi. 


α yo TS 
σάρκας πάντων " ἐλευϑέρων τὲ καὶ δούλων Kal μικρῶν Kal μεγάλων.᾽᾿ s xiii, 16, 


19. καὶ εἶδον τὸ ἱ θηρίον καὶ τοὺς 


u δ᾽ a a rai ὶ τὰ t xiii. I. 
2 AY . κι 

βασιλεῖς τῆς γῆς κα ἃ xvii.g2 
5.11, 2. 


στρατεύματα αὐτῶν συνηγμένα ποιῆσαι "τὸν πόλεμον μετὰ TOD y xvi. ty 


s “~ ~ “ΕἾ 
καθημένου ἐπὶ τοῦ ἵππου, καὶ μετὰ τοῦ στρατεύματος αὐτοῦ. 


καὶ “ ἐπιάσθη τὸ θηρίον, καὶ per 


6” ποιήσας τὰ σημεῖα ἢ ἐνώπιον αὐτοῦ, ἐν οἷς ἐπλάνησε τοὺς λαβόντας 
τὸ χάραγμα τοῦ θηρίου καὶ τοὺς προσκυνοῦντας τῇ εἰκόνι αὐτοῦ» fF 


(the final 
struggle 
of xvi. 
12-16). 

w Cant. il. 
15, Doric 


20: 
αὐτοῦ “ὁ ψευδοπροφήτης 


ἐπιέσθη. 


ζῶντες ἐβλήθησαν οἱ δύο εἰς τὴν "λίμνην τοῦ “ὁ πυρὸς τῆς καιομένης * Χυΐ- 13. 


the Apocalypse is the prerogative of 
messiah as the true Emperor was ap- 
plied to Marduk as the conqueror of 
chaos and the arbiter of all earthly mon- 
archs (cf. Zimmern in Schrader, 373 f.). 

Vv. 17-21: the rout and destruction of 
the Beast and his adherents, modelled 
upon Isaiah lvi. 9 f. and Ezekiel’s de- 
scription of the discomfiture of prince 
Gog (xxxix. 17-21), where beasts as well 
as birds are bidden glut themselves with 
carrion (4). This crude aspect of the 
messianic triumph had commended itself 
to Jewish speculation on the future (see 
En. xc, 2-4); it reflects the intense par- 
ticularism of post-exilic Judaism in cer- 
tain circles, and also the semi-political 
categories which tended to dominate 
the eschatology. In Asc. Isa. iv. 14, the 
Lord also comes with his angels and 
troops to drag into Gehenna Beliar and 
his hosts. 

Ver. 17. ἐν ἡλίῳ, a commanding and 
conspicuous position. 

Ver. 18. In the ancient world, this 
was the worst misfortune possible for the 
dead—to lie unburied, a prey to wild 
birds. On the famous “stele of the 
vultures ’’ (bef. 3000 B.c.) the enemy are 
represented lying bare and being devoured 
by vultures, while the corpses of the royal 
troops are carefully buried. 

Ver. 20. This marks the culmination 
of many previous oracles: the messiah 
meets and defeats (xvi. 13 f.) the beast 
(i.e.,, Nero-antichrist, xi. 7, xiii. 1 ἢ) and 
the false prophet (i.¢c., the Imperial 
priesthood=second beast of xiii. τὰ f.) 
and their allies (the kings of the earth, 
Gf Χ15 0, 18; xiv. 8; XV. 14, XVil.| 12. ἢ), 

VOL. V. 3 


y xiii. 11-17. 
4 ZiLE0 LO; OA, 
Isa. xxx. 33, Dan. vii. 11; cf. Par. Lost, i. 62-69. 


according to a more specific form of the 
tradition reflected in xiv. 14-20. Pos- 
sibly the ghastly repast of ver. 21 is a. 
dramatic foil to that of ver. 9. At any 
rate there is aslight confusion in the 
sketch, due to the presence of hetero- 
geneous conceptions ; whilst one tradition 
made messiah at his coming vanquish all 
the surviving inhabitants of the earth, 
who were ex hypothest opponents of 
God’s people (cf. ii. 26, 27, xi. g f., xii. 
Q, xiv. 14 f., xvi. 13-16, xix, 17 f.), the 
prophet at the same time used the special 
conception of a Nero-antichrist whose 
allies were mainly Eastern chiefs (ix. 14 
f., xvi. 12, xvii. 12 f.), and also shared 
the O.T. belief in a weird independent 
outburst from the skirts of the earth (xx. 
8). Hence the rout of nations here is 
only apparently final. See on xx. 3. The 
lake of fire, a place of torment which 
burns throughout most of the apo- 
calypses (Sibyll. ii. 196-200, 252-253, 
286, etc.; Apoc. Pet. 8), was lit first in 
Enoch. (sec. cent.) where it is the pun- 
ishment reserved for Azazel on the day 
of judgment (ix. 6) and for the fallen 
angels (xxi. 7-10) with their paramours. 
The prophet prefers this to the alter- 
native conception of a river of fire [Slav. 
En. x.]. The whole passage reflects 
traditions such as those preserved (cf. 
Gfrorer ii., 232 f.), e.g., in Targ. Jerus. 
on Gen. xlix. rr and Sohar on Leyvy.- 
Exodus (miracula, uariaque et horrenda 
bella fient mari terraque circa Jerusalem, 
cum messias reuelabitur), where the 
beasts of the field feed for one year, 
and the birds for seven, upon the carcases 
of Israel’s foes. The supreme penalty 


O 


470 
a From Sib. ἐν θείω. 
Or. iii, ξ ΠΥ ΑΗ 
696-7. καθημένου ἐπὶ τοῦ ἵππου, 
αὐτοῦ : " καὶ ὰ ὅ 


inflicted on the opponents of Zoroas- 
trianism is that their corpses are given 
over to the corpse-eating birds, i.e., 
Pan (Vend. iii. 20, ix. 49). Cf. Introd. 

4 ὃ. 

The messiah who forms “ the central 
figure of this bloodthirsty scene,’ written 
like the preceding out of the presbyter’s 
κε savage hatred of Rome ” (Selwyn, 83) 
has a semi-political rather than a trans- 
cendental role to play. The normal 
Christian consciousness (cf. xxii. 12) 
viewed the return of Jesus as ushering 
“in the final requital of mankind; but in 
these special oracles (cf. xvii. 14) where 
a semi-historical figure is pitted against 
Christ on earth, the latter is brought 
down to meet the adversary on his own 
ground—a development of eschatology 
which is a resumption of primitive mes- 
Sianic categories in Judaism. The 
messiah here is consequently a grim, 
silent, implacable conqueror. There 
is no tenderness in the Apocalypse 
save for the pious core of the elect 
people, nothing of that disquiet of heart 
with which the sensitiveness of later 
ages viewed the innumerable dead. Here 
mankind are naively disposed of in huge 
masses; their antagonism to the mes- 
siah and his people is assumed to have 
exposed them to ruthless and inexorable 
doom. Nor do the scenic categories of 
the tradition leave any room for such a 
feeling as dictated Plutarch’s noble de- 
scription (De Sera Uind. 555 E. F.) of 
the eternal pangs of conscience. Upon 
the other hand, there is no gloating over 
the torments of the wicked. 

Now that the destructive work of mes- 
siah is over, the ground seems clear for 
his constructive work (cf. Ps. Sol. xvii. 
26 f.). But the idiosyncracies of John’s 
outlook involve a departure from the 
normal tradition of Judaism and early 
Christianity at this point. Satan, who 
survives, as he had preceded, the Roman 
empire, still remains to be dealt with. 
The third vision of doom, therefore (xx. 
I-10) outlines his final defeat, in two 
panels: (a) one exhibiting a period of 
enforced restraint, during which (for 2, 3 
and 4-7 are synchronous) messiah and 
the martyrs enjoy a halcyon time of tem- 
poral and temporary bliss, (Ὁ) the other 
sketching (7-10) a desperate but un- 
availing recrudescence of the devil’s 


ATIOKAAYYVIZ [TQANNOY 


XIX. 


- , “ 
21. καὶ οἱ λοιποὶ ἀπεκτάνθησαν ἐν τῇ ῥομφαίᾳ τοῦ 


τῇ ἐξελθούσῃ ἐκ τοῦ στόματος 


καὶ πάντα τὰ ὄρνεα ἐχορτάσθησαν ἐκ τῶν σαρκῶν αὐτῶν. 


power. The oracle is brief and un- 
coloured. It rounds off the preceding 
predictions and at the same time paves 
the way for the magnificent finalé of 
XXi.-xxii., on which the writer puts forth 
all his powers. But it is more than 
usually enigmatic and allusive. ‘‘ Dans 
ces derniers chapitres les tableaux qui 
passent sous nos yeux n’ont plus la 
fraicheur vivante de ceux qui ont précédé. 
L’imagination ayant affaire a des con- 
ceptions absolument idéales et sans 
aucune analogie avec les réalités con- 
crétes de la nature, est naturellement 
moins sfire d’elle-méme, et ne parvient 
plus aussi facilement ἃ satisfaire celle 
du lecteur’’ (Reuss). Ingenious attempts 
have been made (eé.g., by Vischer, 
Spitta, and Wellhausen) to disentangle 
a Jewish source from the passage, but 
real problem is raised and solved on 
the soil of the variant traditions which 
John moulded at this point for his 
own Christian purposes. In the crea- 
tion-myth the binding of the chaos- 
dragon or his allies took place at the 
beginning of the world’s history (cf. 
Prayer of Manass. 2-4). As the dragon 
came to be moralised into the power 
of spiritual evil, this temporary restraint 
(cf. on ver. 2) was transferred to the be- 
ginning of the end, by a modification of 
the primitive view which probably goes 
back to Iranian theology (cf. Stave, 
175 f., Baljon, Vélter, 120 f, Briggs, 
etc.). The conception of messiah’s 
reign as preliminary and limited on earth 
was not unknown to Judaism (Encycl. 
Relig. and Ethics, i. 203 f.) or even to 
primitive Christianity (cf. 1 Cor. xv. 21- 
28, where Paul develops it differently), 
But the identification of it with the 
sabbath of the celestial week (which 
was originally non-messianic, cf. Slav. 
En. xxxii, xxxiii.) and the association of 
it with the martyrs are peculiar to John’s 
outlook. A further idiosyncracy is the 
connection between the Gog and Magog 
attack and the final manceuvre of Satan, 
The psychological clue to these con- 
ceptions probably lies in the prophet’s 
desire to provide a special compensation 
for the martyrs, prior to the general 
bliss of the saints. This may have de- 
termined his adoption or adaptation of 
the chiliastic tradition, which also con- 
served the archaic hope of an earthly 


i οὐ νων 


σι. XX. I—4. 


ATIOKAAYYVIS IQANNOY 471 


Ν ” ~ -“ . . 
KX. 1. Kat εἶδον ἄγγελον καταβαίνοντα ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ, ἔχοντα a i. 18, ix. 


τὴν * κλεῖν τῆς " ἀβύσσου καὶ > ἅλυσιν μεγάλην ἐπὶ τὴν χεῖρα αὐτοῦ. 


ἜΣ Oke 
Rom. x. 
74 Esd. 


2. καὶ “expdtyoe Tov δράκοντα, 6 ὄφις ὃ ἀρχαῖος, 20g ἐστι διάβολος iv. 8. 


b Mk. v. 34, 


Ae a \ 2 Ἀπ ΓῚ 4 4 nee ! ae 
καὶ ὁ Σατανᾶς, kat ἔδησεν αὐτὸν "χίλια ἔτη, 3. καὶ ἔβαλεν αὐτὸν ς Mk. vivi7. 


d xii. 9. 


> a »” ἐν Ὁ] eS 3 4 > a ¢ δ 
εἰς τὴν ἄβυσσον καὶ ᾽ ἔκλεισεν καὶ ἐσφράγισεν ἐπάνω αὕτου, LVG μὴ ε =a Day 


of God, 


πλανήσῃ ἔτι TA ἔθνη, ἄχρι τελεσθῇ τὰ χίλια ἔτη peTa ταῦτα δεῖ 1, iv. 


29, 2 Pet. 


λυθῆναι αὐτὸν ἢ μικρὸν χρόνον. 4. Kal εἶδον ' θρόνους---καὶ ἐκάθισαν 7? §. 


cf. Ε. Bt. 


ἐπ᾽ αὐτούς, " καὶ κρίμα ἐδόθη adtois—xat τὰς ' ψυχὰς τῶν ἢ πεπελ- {Γ΄ ΞΟ5Ε. 


εκισμένων "Sid τὴν μαρτυρίαν ᾿Ιησοῦ καὶ διὰ τὸν λόγον τοῦ θεοῦ, Dan. vi. 


Dragon (Theod.) 14. 


= “persons,” sc. εἶδον. 
N.T.). ni. 9. 


reign for the saints without interfering 
with the more spiritual and transcendent 
outlook of xx. 11 f. His procedure fur- 
ther enabled him to preserve the primi- 
tive idea of messiah’s reign [4] as distinct 
from that of God, by dividing the final 
act of the drama into two scenes (4 f., 
ει f.).—With the realistic episode of 
I-3, angels pass off the stage (except the 
angel of xxi. 9 f. and the angelus inter- 
pres of xxii. 6-10), in accordance with 
the Jewish feeling that they were inferior 
to the glorified saints to whom alone (cf. 
Heb. ii. 4) the next world belonged. 
There is no evidence to support the 
conjecture (Cheyne, Bible Problems, 
233) that ἄγγελον in ver. I represents 
‘an already corrupt text of an older 
Hebrew Apocalypse, in which mal’ak 
was written instead of mika@él” (cf. 
above on xii. 7). 

CHAPTER XX.—Vvy. 1-3. The dragon is 
flung by an angel, not by God or messiah, 
into the pit of the abyss which formed his 
original haunt (cf. on ix. 1), and there 
locked up, like an Arabian jin, so as to 
leave the earth undisturbed for the mil- 
lenium. The prophet thus welds together 
two traditions which were originally in- 
dependent. The former echoes Egyptian 
(E. B. D. 4, ‘thine enemy the serpent 
hath been given over to the fire, the 
serpent-fiend hath fallen down headlong ; 
his arms have been bound in chains .. . 
the children of impotent revolt shall never 
more rise up”) and especially Parsee 
eschatology (Huibschmann, 227 f.) which 
held that one sign of the latter days was 
the release of the dragon Dahaka—once 
bound fast at mount Demavend—to cor- 
rupt the earth and eventually to be 
destroyed prior to the advent of the 
messiah and the resurrection of the dead. 


g xill. 14, xvi. 13, 2 Th. ii. 9-10, cf. Weinel, 21. 
in Apoc. = “angels”; cf. Matt. xix. 28 = Luke xxii. 30. 
m Mt. xiv. 10, Acts xii. 2, Rom. viii. 35, Clem. Rom. v.-vi. (ἄπ. Aey. 


f From 
17 and 
Bel and 
h xvii. 10, i Never 
Κι Cor. vi. 2, Sap. iii. 8. lvi.g 


The Iranian view was that Fredun could 
not kill the serpent, whose slaughter was 
reserved for for Same (Bund. xxix. 9). 
But John abstains from giving any reason 
for the devil’s reappearance. He simply 
accepts the tradition and falls back (ver. 
3) piously upon the δεῖ of a myste- 
rious providence. Some enigmatic hints 
in a late post-exilic apocalypse (Isa. xxiv. 
21, 22, the hosts on high and the kings on 
earth to be shut up in the prison of the 
pit but—after many days—to be visited, 
t.e., released), upon which John has al- 
ready drawn, had been developed by subse- 
quent speculation (cf. the fettering of 
Azazel, En. x. 4 f., liv. 5 f.) into the 
dogma of a divine restraint placed fora 
time upon the evil spirit(s); see S. C. 
gt f., Charles’ Eschatology, 200 f.—€0vy. 
Strictly speaking, the previous tradition 
(xix. 18, 21) left no inhabitants on earth 
at all. Such discrepancies were inevit- 
able in the dovetailing of disparate con- 
ceptions, but the solution of the incon- 
gruity here probably lies in the interpre- 
tation of ἔθνη as outlying nations on the 
fringe of the empire (8) who had not 
shared in the campaign of Nero-anti- 
christ and consequently had survived the 
doom of the latter and his allies (ct 
xviii. 0). 

Vv. 4-6. The millennium. 

Ver. 4. θρόνους, tribunal-seats for the 
assessors of the divine judge (as in Dan. 
vii. 9, 10, 22, of which this is a replica). 
The unnamed occupants (saints includ- 
ing martyrs? as in Daniel) are allowed 
to manage the judicial processes (so 
Dan. vii. 22, where the Ancient of days 
τὸ κρίμα ἔδωκεν ἁγίοις Ὑψίστου) which 
constituted a large part of Oriental gov- 
ernment. But no stress is laid on this 
incidental remark, and the subjects of 


472 


o Defining 
or ex- 


AITOKAAYYVIZ IQANNOY 


XX, 


° ‘ j ’ ~ 
καὶ “ οἵτινες οὐ προσεκύνησαν τὸ θηρίον οὐδὲ Thy εἰκόνα αὐτοῦ 


5 A - “- 
panding, καὶ οὐκ ἔλαβον τὸ χάραγμα ἐπὶ τὸ μέτωπον καὶ ἐπὶ τὴν χεῖρα αὐτῶν " 


NOt SPECI Vrs X 

fying (as καὶ ἢ ἔζησαν καὶ 

i. 7) some 

of the 

previous . 

class. y 
p ‘‘Camet 


ἀνάστασις ἡ πρώτη. 


“ ἐβασίλευσαν μετὰ "τοῦ Χριστοῦ χίλια ἔτη 5. 
οἱ λοιποὶ τῶν νεκρῶν " οὐκ ἔζησαν * ἄχρι τελεσθῇ τὰ χίλια ἔτη. αὕτη 
6. Μακάριος καὶ ἅγιος ὃ ἔχων “ μέρος ἐν 


A O TRS , a , > , ve ὃ , ΄ 3 3» 
life,’as τῇ ἀναστάσει ΤῊ πρώτῃ " ἐπὶ TOUTWY O DEUTEPOS θάνατος οὐκ EXEL 


11. 8. 

“ Con- 
stative 
aor. 
Moult. i. 130. 
xiii. 8; cof. Mt. xxiv. 51. 


r xi. 15, Xii. 10. 5 
V ii. 11, xxi. 8. 


this sway are left undefined; they are 
evidently not angels (Jewish belief, 
shared by Paul). Such elements of 
vagueness suggest that John took over 
the trait as a detail of the traditional 
scenery. His real interest is in the 
martyrs, for whom he reserves (cf. Eus. 
H.E. vi. 42) the privilege assigned us- 
ually by primitive Christianity either to 
the apostles or to Christians in general. 
They are allotted the exclusive right of 
participating in the messianic interreg- 
num.—tretehextopevev, beheaded by the 
lictor’s axe, the ancient Roman method 
of executing criminals (cf. Introd. § 6). 
Under the empire citizens were usually 
beheaded by the sword. The archaic 
phrase lingered on, like our own “ exe- 
cution’’. Here it is probably no more 
than a periphrasis for ‘‘ put to death’’. 
Even if kal οἵτινες meant a second divi- 
sion, it must, in the light of xi. 7, xiii. 15, 
denote martyrs and confessors (who had 
suffered on the specific charge of refusing 
to worship the emperor).—yiMta ἔτη, 
tenfold the normal period of human life 
(Plato, Rep. 615), but here=the cosmic 
sabbath which apocalyptic and rabbinic 
speculation (deriving from Gen. ii. 2 and 
Ps. xc. 4) placed at the close of creation 
(cf. Drummond's ¥ewish Messiah, 316 f.; 
Bacher’s Agada d. Tann.? i. 133 f.; 
E. Bi. iii. 3095-3097 ; Encycl. of Religion 
and Ethics, i. 204 f., 209). John post- 
pones the παλιγγενεσία till this period 
is over (contrast Matt. xix. 28). He says 
nothing about those who were living 
when the millenium began, and only 
precarious inferencescan bedrawn. Does 
ver. 6 contain the modest hope that he 
and other loyal Christians might partici- 
pate in it? or does the second (καὶ οἵτινες) 
class represent (or include) the living 
loyalists (so, e.g., Simcox, Weiss, Bous- 
set)? The latter interpretation involves 
an awkward ambiguity in the meaning of 
ἔζησαν (=came to life, and also continued 
to live), conflicts with οἱ λ. τ. νεκρῶν (5) 


s Isa, xxvi. 14. 


c AES & εἢ A 
ἐξουσίαν, ἀλλ᾽ ἔσονται ™ ἱερεῖς τοῦ Θεοῦ Kal τοῦ Χριστοῦ - καὶ * βασι- 


t Cf. Blass, ὃ 65, το. u xxi. 8, Joh. 


wi. 6. x v. 10, Isa. lxi. 6. 


and ψυχὰς (4), and is therefore to be set 
aside, as 5-6 plainly refer to both classes 
of 4. A third alternative would be to 
suppose that all Christians were ex hypo- 
thest dead by the time that the period 
of xx. 1 f. arrived, the stress of persecu- 
tion (cf. on xiii. 8 f.) having proved se 
severe that no loyalist could survive (cf. 
below, on ver. 11). 

Ver. 6. An interpolated explanation of 
the preceding vision. “Aytos, if a con- 
tinuation of pak., must almost be taken 
in its archaic sense of ‘‘ belonging to 
God’’. The ordinary meaning reduces 
the phrase to a hysteron proteron, unless 
the idea is that the bliss consists in holi- 
ness (so Vendidad xix. 22, “ happy, happy 
the man who is holy with perfect holi- 
ness’’). ‘‘ Blessed and holy,” however, 
was a con¥entional Jewish term of praise 
and corfratulation (cf. Jub. ii. 23).—é 
δεύτ. θάνατος κιτιλ. According to the 
Hellenic faith recorded in Plutarch (in his 
essay on “the face in the moon’s orb’’), 
the second death, which gently severs 
the mind from the soul, is a boon, not a 
punishment. But John’s view reflects. 
the tradition underlying the Iranian be- 
lief (Brandt, 586 f., 592) that the right- 
eous were exempt from the second death 
(defined as in xxi. 8). The clause ἀλλ᾽ 
- - - Χριστοῦ refers to the permanent 
Standing (i. 6, v. 10 a) of these risen 
martyrs not only during but after the 
millennium ; otherwise it would be mean- 
ingless, since the danger of the second 
death (as the penalty inflicted on all who 
are condemned at the final assizes) does 
not emerge until the millennium is. 
over. The subsequent clause καὶ Baor- 
λεύσουσι K.T.A. is independent, refer- 
ring back to the special and temporary 
privilege of the first resurrection and the 
millennium. For this reason it is preca- 
rious to infer from ἔσονται ἱερεῖς τοῦ 
θεοῦ καὶ τοῦ Χριστοῦ (elsewhere τῷ θεῷ) 
that the occupation of these saints is. 
the mediation of divine knowledge to the 


5—8. 


λεύσουσι pet αὐτοῦ χίλια ἔτη. 


Ξ - a Ἐν ἂν A 2 , 

ἔτη, "λυθήσεται ὃ Σατανᾶς * ἐκ τῆς φυλακῆς αὐτοῦ, 8. καὶ ἐξελεύσεται ἃ 

πλανῆσαι τὰ ἔθνη τὰ " ἐν ταῖς τέσσαρσι γωνίαις τῆς γῆς, τὸν " Γὼγ 
Ν - 

καὶ τὸν Μαγώγ, συναγαγεῖν αὐτοὺς εἰς τὸν πόλεμον, ὧν ὁ ἀριθμὸς υ 


ἔθνη whom Satan is temporarily pre- 
vented from beguiling. The likelihood 
is that the phrase simply denotes as else- 
where the bliss of undisturbed access to 
God and of intimate fellowship. John 
ignores the current belief that the loyal 
survivors on earth would be rewarded (cf. 
Dan. xii. 12; Ps. Sol. xvii. 50, etc.), which 
is voiced in Asc. Isa. iv. 14-16, but he re- 
produces independently the cognate view 
(Asc. Isa. iv. 16 f.) that “‘the saints will 
come with the Lord with their garments 
which are (now) stored up on high in 
the seventh heaven [cf. Apoc. vi. 11]... 
they will descend and be present in this 
world” (after which the Beloved exe- 
cutes judgment at the resurrection). 
He, retains, however, not only the 
general resurrection (12) but the variant 
and earlier idea (cf. 4 Esd. vii. 26 f.) of a 
resurrection (ἔζησαν, 4) confined to the 
saints. Hecalls this the first resurrec- 
tion not because the martyrs and con- 
fessors who enjoyed it had to undergo a 
second in the process of their final re- 
demption but because it preceded the 
only kind of resurrection with which 
sinners and even ordinary Christians had 
anything to do (Titius, 37-40; Baldens- 
perger, 74, 79 f.).—Kat βασιλεύσουσι, 
apparently on earth. This would be 
put beyond doubt were we to take the 
view of the risen martyrs’ occupation 
which has been set aside above. But, 
even apart from this, in the light of all 
relevant tradition and of the context, the 
earth must be the sphere of the millen- 
nium; Christ might of course be con- 
ceived to execute his sovereignty from 
heaven, but, though ver. 9 denotes a 
different cycle of tradition from 4-6, it 
is put on the same plane, and the vision 
of 4 (cf. 1) is evidently this world. ἐπὶ 
τῆς γῆς would be more in keeping with 
this context than with that of v. 10, 
where again the refrain of xxii. 5 (x. B. 
εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων) would be 
more δρρτορτίδίε.---χίλια ἔτη. This 
enigmatic and isolated prediction has 
led to more unhappy fantasies of specu- 


lation and conduct than almost any other 


passage of the N.T. It stands severely 
apart from the sensuous expectations of 


AITOKAAY¥IZ ILQANNOY 


A ~ 
7. καὶ ὅταν τελεσθῇ τὰ χίλια ν Ver. 3. 
2 Uf... 5. 
vii. I, cf. 
Isa. xi. 12, 
Ezek. 
Vii. 2. 
Cf. 
W inck- 
‘ ler’s Alt- 
Orient. Forsch. ii. 160 f., and E. Bi, 4331 f- 


current chiliasm (fertility of soil, long- 
evity, a religious carnival, etc.), but even 
its earliest interpreters, Papias and Jus- 
tin, failed to appreciate its reticence, its 
special object, and its semi-transcendent 
atmosphere. For its relevance, or rather 
irrelevance, to the normal Christian 
outlook, see Denney’s Studies in Theo- 
logy, pp. 231 f., and A. Robertson’s 
Regnum Dei, pp. 113 f. When the mil- 
lennium or messianic reign was thus ab- 
breviated into a temporary phase of 
providence in the latter days, the resur- 
rection had to be shifted from its original 
position prior to the messianic reign; it 
now became, as here, the sequel to that 
period. 

Vv. 7-10: As Baligant, lord of the 
pagans, issues from the East to challenge 
Charlemagne and be crushed, Satan 
emerges from his prison for a short 
period (3) after the millennium, musters 
an enormous army of pagans to besiege 
the holy capital, but is decisively routed 
and flung into the lake of fire to share 
the tortures of his former agents. The 
tenses shift from future (7-8, to δ) to 
aorist (9-10 a) the latter (cf. xi. 11) being 
possibly due to the influence of Semitic 
idiom. 

Ver. 8. Satan’s return to encounter 
irretrievable defeat upon the scene of 
his former successes (ἐπ᾿ ἐσχάτου ἐτῶν 
Ezek. xxxviii. 8), is an obscure and 
curious feature, borrowed in part from 
earlier beliefs in Judaism (Gog and the 
Parthians both from the dreaded N. E., 
Ezek. xxxviii. 4), but directly or indirectly 
from a legend common to Persian and 
Hellenic eschatology: in the former the 
evil spirit has a preliminary and a final 
defeat, while in the latter the Titans 
emerge from Tartarus only to be con- 
clusively worsted (Rohde, Psyche, 410 
f.). No explanation is given of how 
Satan gets free. In the Iranian eschat- 
ology (Brandt, 590 f.) the serpent 
breaks loose at the call of Angra Mainy6é 
(God's opponent), seduces a part of 
mankind and persecutes the rest, till he 
is overcome by the messiah, who then 
proceeds to raise the dead. But as John 
identifies the serpent with Satan, such a 


474 


c Pleon- © αὐτῶν ὡς 6 2 


astic (cf. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 


ἄμμος τῆς θαλάσσης. 


XX. 


9. καὶ ἀνέβησαν ἐπὶ τὸ 


iii. 8, εἴς). “ πλάτος τῆς γῆς, καὶ ᾿ ἐκύκλευσαν τὴν παρεμβολὴν τῶν ἁγίων καὶ 


d Gen. xxii. , 7 . 5 r 
17, xxxii. THY πόλιν τὴν © ἠγαπημένην - 
12, Heb. 
xi. I2, on 
form (omitting initial wy) cf. Helbing, 22. 
g See iii. 9, and on xxi. 7; Ps. Ixxviii. 68, Ixxxvii. 
2 Kings i. 10, Zech. xii. 9, Isa. xxvi. 11. 


theory was plainly out of the question. 
At any rate, Satan wins adherents for this 
fresh attempt from those barbarian hordes 
who survived the downfall of the Roman 
empire (xix. 17-21). They are called 
‘Gog and Magog,” after the traditional 
opponents who were to be defeated by 
the redeemed Israel of the latter days, ac- 
cording to the faith of Judaism (Ezek. 
XXXViii.-xxxix.). Jerusalem, the navel and 
centre of the earth (Ezek. xxxviii. 12) as 
messiah’s residence, is besieged; but, like 
Gog of old, the invaders are consumed by 
the divine fire, whilst Satan is consigned 
for ever to the lake of fire, where he lies 
writhing among his worshippers, as a 
punishment for seducing men. This is at 
once a reminiscence of the Iranian es- 
chatology (Hiibschmann, 231), where the 
serpent is flung into molten metal as his 
final doom, in order to rid earth of his pre- 
sence, and also a reflection of Enoch liv. 
(Ixvii. 7) where the four angels grip the 
hosts of Azazel on the last day and 
“cast them into a burning furnace, that 
the Lord of Spirits may take vengeance 
on them for leading astray those who 
dwell on earth ”’. 

Ver. 9. παρεμβολή, either camp (as 
in O.T., eg., Deut. xxiii. 14) or army 
(Heb. xi. 34), the saints being supposed 
to lie in a circle or leaguer round the 
headquarters of the messiah in Jeru- 
salem, which—by an association common 
in the ancient world (e.g., Nineveh, “the 
beloved city”’ of her god Ishtar)—is termed 
his beloved city. The phrase is an im- 
plicit answer (cf. on iii. 9) to the claim 
of contemporary Judaism which held to 
the title of ‘‘God’s beloved” as its 
monopoly (Apoc. Bar. v. 1, xxi. 21, εἴ. 
Sir. xxiv. 11). In the Hebrew Elias-apo- 
calypse of the 3rd century (cf. Butten- 
wieser, E. $. i. 681-2), where Gog 
and Magog also appear after the mil- 
lennium to besiege Jerusalem, their an- 
nihilation is followed by the judgment 
and the descent of Jerusalem from heaven. 
This tradition of xx. 4-10 therefore be- 
longs to the cycle from which xi. 1-13 
(xiv. 14-20) was drawn; Jerusalem, freed 
from her foes and purified within, forms 
the headquarters of messiah’s tem- 


e Hab. i. 6, Ezek. xxxviii. 11. 


ΗΝ Ὁ ΄ a > ~ > a x 
και κατέβη πυρ εκ του oupavou και 


f 2 Kings vi. 14. 


2, Jer. pxi, 15. h Ezek. xxxviii. 22. xxxix. 6, 


porary reign, tenanted not simply by 
devout worshippers but by martyrs (cf. 
xiv. I-5, on mount Zion). Yet only a 
new and heavenly Jerusalem is finally 
adequate (xxi. f.); it descends after 
the last punishment and judgment (xi. 
15 f.=xx. τὸ f.). Wetstein cites from 
the Targ. Jonath. a passage which has 
suggested elements in this and in the 
preceding (xi. 17-21) vision: a king rises 
in the last days from the land of Magog, 
et omnes populi obedient illi; after their 
rout by fire their corpses lie a prey to 
wild beasts and birds. Then ‘all the 
dead of Israel shall live. . . and receive 
the reward of their works’. In the 
highest spirit of the O.T., however, 
John rejects the horrible companion 
thought (En. Ixxxix. 58, xciv. I0, xcvii. 2) 
that God gloats over the doom of the 
damned. An onset of foreign nations 
upon Jerusalem naturally formed a stereo- 
typed feature in all Jewish expectations 
of latter-day horrors; here, however, as 
the city is ifso facto tenanted by holy 
citizens, the siege is ineffective (contrast 
xi. 1 ἢ). Neither here nor in xix. 21 are 
the rebellious victims consigned at death 
to eternal punishment, as are the beast, 
the false prophet, and Satan. The 
human tools of the latter die, but they 
are raised (xx. 11 f.) for judgment (ver. 
15), though the result of their trial is a 
foregone conclusion (xiii. 8, xiv. 9-10). 
In En. lvi., from which this passage 
borrows, Gog and Magog are represented 
by the Medes and the Parthians from 
whom (between 100 and 46 B.c.) a hostile 
league against Palestine might have 
been expected by contemporaries. But 
the destruction of the troops is there 
caused by civil dissensions. In our 
Apocalypse the means of destruction is 
supernatural fire, as in 2 Thess. i. 8, ii. 
8, 4 Esd. xii. 33, xiii. 38-39, Ap. Bar. 
xxvii. 10, Asc. Isa. iv. 18 (where fire issues 
from the Beloved to consume all the 
godless); the Parthians also appear 
some time before the end, in the penulti- 
mate stage when the Roman empire and 
its Nero-antichrist make their last attack. 
But the prophet is still left with the 
orthodox eschatological tradition of Gog 


ie i eee 


g—12. 


κατέφαγεν αὐτούς - το. καὶ 6 διάβολος ὁ ᾿ πλανῶν αὐτοὺς ἐβλήθη i -- ὃς 


2 Ν EX “ Ν ‘ 6 , a ‘ ‘ θ , 
εἰς Τὴν ἱβνὴν TOU πυρος και €lou, ὁπου KGL TO σηρίον και ὁ 


ΑΠΟΚΛΛΥΨΙΣ [QANNOY 


475 


5 , 


ἐπλάνα 
(cf. Eph. 


iv. 28). 


ἂν ἁ 


, δι) ὁ , ε , ‘ ‘ > 
ψευδοπροφήτης - καὶ ᾿βασανισθήσονται ἡμέρας καὶ νυκτὸς εἰς τοὺς k xix. 20, 


αἰῶνας τῶ» αἰώνων. 


ix. Καὶ εἶδον ™ θρόνον " μέγαν ° λευκὸν 


Ν Ν , ἥν ns 
καὶ Tov καθήμενον ἐπ᾽ αὐτὸν, 


a οἱ Ν Le] ’ Pp 2 ε “ we > , 
οὗ ἀπὸ τοῦ προσώπου ἢ ἔφυγεν ἡ γῆ καὶ ὁ οὐρανὸς, 


καὶ ᾿ τόπος οὐχ εὑρέθη “ αὐτοῖς. 


En. χε. 
cf. Mt. 
ΧΙ]. 41-42, 
XXV, 41 
(No 
mention 
of fate of 
devil's 
angels, ig 
Apoc.). 


12. Kat εἶδον τοὺς νεκρούς, τοὺς μεγάλους Kai τοὺς μικρούς, ib) 


ἑστῶτας ἐνώπιον τοῦ θρόνου, a der 
\r , > , F 9. 
καὶ * βιβλία ἠνοίχθησαν ἜΡΤΗΙ 
tinct from 
Rp RAL: ὡς ἃ 5 those of 
iV. 4, 2X. 4. o = unsullied justice? p xvi. 20, xxi. 1, Isa. xiii. 13, xxiv. 19-20. q From 
Dan. 11. 35. τ Dan. vii. 10, Mal. iii. 16, Jer. xvii. 5. Encycl. Relig. and Ethics, ii, 792-795. 


and Magog, an episode (consecrated by the 
Ezekiel-prophecy and later belief) which 
he feels obliged to work in somehow. 
Hence his arrangement of Satan’s final 
recrudescence in juxtaposition with the 
Gog and Magog outburst (cf. on xvi. 16, 
and Kiausner’s messian. Vorstellungen d. 
714. Volkes im Zeit. d. Tannaiten, pp. 61 
f.). The latter, an honoured but by this 
time awkward survival of archaic escha- 
tology, presented a similar difficulty to 
the Talmudic theology which variously 
put it before, or after, the messianic reign 
(Volz, pp. 175 f.). In his combination of 
messianic beliefs, John follows the tradi- 
tion, accepted in Sib. Or. iii. 663 f., 
which postponed the irruption till after 
messiah’s temporary period of power. 

XX. II-xxii. 5. The connexion of 
thought depends upon the traditional 
Jewish scheme outlined, e.g., in Apoc. 
Bar. xxix.-xxx. (cf. 4 Esd. vii. 29, 30) 
where the messiah returns in glory to 
heaven after his reign on earth; the 
general resurrection follows, accom- 
panied by the judgment. Developing 
his oracles along these current lines, the 
prophet now proceeds to depict his cul- 
minating vision of the End in three 
scenes: (i.) the world and its judgment 
(xx. II-1s), (ii.) the new heaven and earth 
(xx#- 1-8), centring round (iii.) the new 
Jerusalem as the final seat of bliss (xxi. 
g-xxii. 5). The last-named phase was as- 
sociated in eschatology (Sib. Or. v. 246 f., 
414 f.) with the return of Nero redivivus 
and the downfall of Babylon which pre- 
ceded the sacred city’s rise. The destruc- 
tion of hostile forces, followed by the re- 
novation of the universe, is essentially a 
Persian dogma (Stave, 18o f.), and is 
paralleled in the Babylonian mythology, 


where after the defeat and subjugation 
of Tiamat in the primeval age creation 
commences. From this point until xxi. 
g f., Jesus is ignored entirely. 

Vv. 11-15. The moral dignity and retic- 
ence with which this sublime vision of the 
last assize is drawn, show how the primi- 
tive Christian conscience could rise above 
its inheritance from Jewish eschatology. 
The latter spoke more definitely upon 
the beginning of the end than upon the 
end itself (cf. Harnack’s History of 
Dogma, i. 174). 

Ver. 11. John hints where Isaiah is 
explicit (vi. 1). Nothing is said about 
the uselessness of intercession; cf. 4 
Esd. vii. [102-115] 33: ‘“‘ and the Most 
High shall be revealed upon the judg- 
ment-seat, and compassion shall pass 
away, long-suffering shall be with- 
drawn’. Enoch xc. 20 sets up the 
throne near Jerusalem, and most apo- 
calypses are spoiled by similarly puerile 
details. Compare with 11 ὁ the tradition 
in Asc. Isa. iv. 18 where the voice of the 
Beloved (i.e., messiah) at the close of 
the millennium rebukes in wrath heaven 
and earth, the hills and cities, the angels 
of the sun and moon, “ and all things 
wherein Beliar manifested himself and 
acted openly in this world”. John’s Apo- 
calypse, however, follows (yet cf. xxii. 
12) that tradition of Judaism which re- 
served the judginent for God and not for 
the messiah (4 Esd. vi. 1-10, vii. 33 f. 
anti-Christian polemic ?) although an- 
other conception (En. xlv. 3, Ixix. 27 
etc.; Ap. Bar. lxxii. 2-6) assigning it to 
the messiah had naturally found greater 
favour in certain Christian circles. 

Ver. 12. The books opened in God’s 
court contain the deeds of men, whose 


476 


S iii. 5, xiii. 
8, xvii. 8, 
En. xvii. 
3, ΟἿ. 3, 
cf. Eurip. 
Fragm. 
488. 

t 2 Cor.v. 
το, Rom. 
li. 2:11. 
Jo. v. 28- 


» 


13. 


auTots° 


u For anc. 
Gk. idea 
of sea 
preven- 
ting dead 


from passing into Hades, cf. Radermacher’s Das Jenseits im Mythos d. Hellenen (1903) 74. 
w vi. 8, cf. Charles on En. Ixiii. 10. 


18, Isa, xxvi. 10. 


fate is determined by the evidence of 
these ‘‘ vouchers for the book of life” 
(Alford) ; the latter volume forms as it 
were a register of those predestinated to 
eternal life (cf. Gfrorer ii. 121 f., and 
below on ver. 15). The figure of books 
containing a record of man’s career was 
a realistic expression of Jewish belief in 
moral retribution, which prevailed es- 
pecially in eschatological literature (¢.g., 
Jubil. xxx.; Enoch. Ixxxix.-xc.; Dan. vii. 
ro, etc.) after the exile. ‘‘ And in these 
lays 1 saw the Head of days, when he 
had seated himself upon the throne of 
his glory, and the books of the living 
were opened before him ”’ (Enoch xlvii. 
3; cf. Driver’s Daniel, p. 86). It is 
obvious, from ver. 15, that the resurrec- 
tion is general (as Dan. vii. 20; 4 Esd. 
vi. 20, vii. 32; Test. Jud. 25; Test. Benj. 
10; Apoc. Bar. 7, etc.; cf. Gfrérer, ii. 
277 f.; and Charles’s Eschatology, 340 
f.), in opposition to the primitive and 
still prevalent belief which confined it 
to the righteous (E. Bi. 1390). Hence 
the books contain not the good deeds 
alone of the saints (the prevalent Jewish 
idea, cf. Charles on En. li. 1; Mal. iii. 
16; Jub. xxx.; Ps. lvi. 8, etc.), nor bad 
deeds alone (Isa. Ixv. 6; En. Ixxxi. 4; of. 
En. xc. 20; Apoc. Bar. xxiv. 1) but good 
and bad deeds alike (as Dan. vii. 10; 
Asc. Isa. ix. 20 f.). This again tallies 
with the Iranian faith (Hibschmann, 
229), according to which, at the com- 
mand of Ormuzd, the righteous and the 
wicked alike were raised for their re- 
compense. Here the tribunal is a 
throne, before which the king’s subjects 
have to answer for their conduct ; rebels 
are punished and the loyal get the re- 
ward of good service (cf. xxii. 12, etc.). 
γεγρᾶμμ., by whom? Jewish specula- 
tion conjectured Raphael as the record- 
ing angel (En. xx. 3) or a band of 
angels (Slav. En. xix. 5); but the Jewish 
idea of the heavenly tables (πλάκες τοῦ 


ΑἸΙΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ LQANNOY 


καὶ ἄλλο " βιβλίον ἠνοίχθη, 6 


NES) ’ μὴ 
καὶ ἐκρίθησαν ἕκαστος 


a 


ἐστιν τῆς ζωῆς " 


καὶ ἐκρίϑησαν οἱ νεκροὶ ἐκ τῶν γεγραμμένων ἐν τοῖς βιβλίοις, 
ἱ κατὰ τὰ ἔργα αὐτῶν. 

Καὶ ἔδωκεν ἡ “ θάλασσα τοὺς νεκροὺς τοὺς ἐν αὐτῇ, 

καὶ ὃ “θάνατος καὶ 6 “adns ἔδωκαν τοὺς νεκροὺς τοὺς ἐν 


By , 7 2A 
κατὰ τὰ cpya αὐτων. 


vi. 


οὐρανοῦ) is omitted in the Apoc., nor is 
there the slightest mention of those living 
at the era of judgment. Did John mean 
that none would survive (cf. ver. 5) ? 
Or were any survivors to be taken directly 
to heaven at the coming of Christ, as in 
Paul’s primitive outlook (see on 1 Th. 
iv. 16-17) ? 

Ver.) 13. See! Pirke -Aboth, ἀν 32): 
‘“« Let not thine imagination assure thee 
that the grave is an asylum ”’ (for, like 
birth and life and death, judgment is ap- 
pointed before the King of the kings of 
kings). ‘‘And the earth shall restore 
those that are asleep in her, and so shall 
the dust those that dwell therein in 
silence, and the secret chambers shall 
deliver up those souls (of the righteous, 
iv. 35) that were committed unto them,” 
4 Esd. vii. 32—reproducing, 45 here, 
Enoch li. 1, ‘and in those days will the 
earth also give back those who are trea- 
sured up within it, and Sheol also will 
give back that which it has received, 
and hell will give back that which it 
owes”. Also En. Ixi. 5 where the res- 
toration includes “‘ those who have been 
destroyed by the desert, or devoured by 
the fish of the sea and by the beasts”’. 
Evidently drowned people are supposed 
not to be in Hades; they wander about 
or drift in the ocean (Achill. Tat. v. 313), 
μηδὲ eis ἅδου καταβαίνειν ὅλως. Ac- 
cording to the prophet’s conception (cf. 
xiii. 8, xiv. 9 f.) the fate of pagans must 
have been a foregone conclusion, when 
the Imperial cultus was made the test of 
character; in which case “ the scene be- 
fore the white throne is rather a final 
statement of judgment than a statement 
of final judgment ᾿" (Gilbert). But the 
broader allusion, to works here shows 
that the prophet is thinking of the 
general ethical judgment, which em- 
braced issues wider than the particular 
historical test of the Emperor-worship. 
-- ἄδης «.t.d., cf Plutarch’s (de Iside, 


AITOKAAY¥VIZ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 


I3—I5. 


477 


14. Kat 6 “θάνατος καὶ ὃ adns ἐβλήθησαν εἰς τὴν λίμνην Tod x τ Cor. xv. 
20, 1Sa 


πυρός * xxv. 8, 
a ς 5 , ins ΠΡ A δ 7 4 Ἐ 84. vil 
[οὗτος ὁ θάνατος " δεύτερός ἐστιν, ἡ λίμνη τοῦ πυρός] 31. 
Zi a a y Cf. on 
15. καὶ εἴ τις οὐχ εὑρέθη ἐν τῇ βίβλῳ τῆς ζωῆς γεγραμμένος, Luke xii, 
4:5. 


ἐβλήθη εἰς τὴν λίμνην τοῦ πυρός. 


1 Om. ovtos... πυρος with eight minn., Me., Arm. (Aug.), Andbav, Pr., Haym. 
as a marginal gloss [so, ¢.g., Kriiger, (Gott. Gel. Anz., 1897, 34), von Soden, Bous- 
set (?), and Wellhausen (with 14a and 15)], perhaps displaced from its original posi- 
tion after 15, where it would suit the context (Haussleiter, 212-213), since there is 


no question of the second death except for human beings. 


The misplacement was 


probably due to the attraction of θανατος in 14. 


29) derivation of Amenthes, the Egyptian 
name for Hades, as ‘“* that which receives 
and gives’’. Asin Slav. En. Ixv. 6 and 
‘the later Iranian Bundehesh (5. B. E. 
v. 123 f.), the resurrection of the body is 
not mentioned, though it is probably im- 
plied (cf. En. li. 1, Ixii. 14 and Matt. 
XXVii. 52 f.). 

Ver. 14. Death as Sin’s ally must be 
destroyed along with Sin, while Hades, 
the grim receptacle of Death’s prey (the 
intermediate rendezvous for the dead, 
except for martyrs, cf. vi. Io), naturally 
ceases to have any function. This was 
the cherished hope of early Christianity 
as of Judaism (Isa. xxv. 8). John’s idea 
of the second death is much more real- 
istic and severe than the Hellenic or the 
Philonic (cf. de Praem. et Poen. § 12, 
etc.). 

Ver. 15. In Enoch (xxxviii. 5, xviii. 9) 
‘the wicked are handed over by God to 
‘the saints, before whom they burn like 
straw in fire and sink like lead in water. 
The milder spirit of the Christian pro- 
phet abstains from making the saints 
thus punish or witness the punishment 
of the doomed (cf. on xiv. 10). In Apoc. 
Pet. 25 the souls of the murdered gaze 
on the torture of their former persecutors, 
crying 6 θεὸς, δικαία σου ἡ κρίσις. 
These features, together with those of 
torturing angels (Dieterich, 60 f.) and 
Dantesque gradations of punishment 
(Dieterich,206 f.), are conspicuous by their 
absence from John’s Apocalypse. There 
is a stern simplicity about the whole de- 
‘scription, and just enough pictorial detail 
is given to make the passage morally 
‘suggestive. As gehenna, like paradise 
(4 Esd. iii. 4), was created before the 
world, according to rabbinic belief (Gfré- 
ter, ii. 42-46), it naturally survived the 
collapse of the latter (ver. 11). Contrast 
‘with this passage the relentless spirit of 
4 Esd. vii. 49 f. (“1 will not mourn over 
“the multitude of the perishing . . . they 


are set on fire and burn hotly and are 
quenched”’). 1f John betrays no pity for 
the doomed, he exhibits no callous scorn 
for their fate. The order of xx. 13-15 
and xxi. 1 ἢ, is the same as in the hag- 
gadic pseudo-Philonic De Biblic. Anti- 
quitatibus (after 70 a.D.) where the judg- 
ment (“reddet infernus debitum suum 
et perditio restituet paratecen suam, ut 
reddam unicuique secundum opera sua’’) 
is followed by the renewal of all things 
(εἰ exstinguetur mors et infernus 
claudet os suum... et erit terra alia 
et caelum aliud habitaculum sempi- 
ternum’’). 

So much for the doomed. The bliss of 
Saints occupies the closing vision (xxi.- 
xxii. 5). From the smoke and pain and 
heat it is a relief to pass into the clear, 
clean atmosphere of the eternal morning 
where the breath of heaven is sweet and 
the vast city of God sparkles like a dia- 
mond in the radiance of his presence. 
The dominant idea of the passage is that 
surroundings must be in keeping with 
character and prospects; consequently, 
as the old universe has been hope- 
lessly sullied by sin, a new order of 
things must be formed, once the old 
scene of trial and failure is swept aside. 
This hope of the post-exilic Judaism (cf. 
Isa. Ixv. 17, Ixvi. 22) was originally de 
rived from the Persian religion, in which 
the renovation of the universe was a 
cardinal tenet; it is strongly developed 
in Enoch (xci. 16, civ. 2, new heaven 
only) and 4 Esd. iv. 27 f. (‘if the place 
where the evil is sown pass not away, 
there cannot come the field where the 
good is sown’’). The expectation (cf. 
on Rom. viii. 28 f.) that the loss sus- 
tained at the fai! of Adam would now be 
made good, is haidly the same as thi 
eschatological transformation; the lattes 
prevailed whenever the stern exigencies 
of the age seemed to demand a clean 
sweep of the universe, and the m-sea 


478 


a Cf. xx. 11, 
En. xlv. 
4°59, 
xxii. I. 


lyptic attitude towards nature seldom 
had anything of the tenderness and 
pathos, e.g., of 4 Esd. viii. 42-48 (cf. vii. 
31). The sequence of xx. 11 f. and xxi. 
1 f. therefore follows the general escha- 
tological programme, as e.g. in Apoc. 
Bar. xxi. 23 f., where, after death is 
ended (very mildly), the new world pro- 
mised by God appears as the dwel- 
ling-place of the saints (cf. also xxxil. 
I f.). The earthly Jerusalem is good 
enough for the millennium but not for 
the tinal bliss; the new order (xxi. 5) of 
latter (cf. above) coincides, as in Oriental 
religion (Jeremias, 45 f.), with the new 
year (i.e., spring) festival of the god’s 
final victory.— he literary problem is 
more intricate. With xxi. 1-8, which is 
evidently the prophet’s own composition, 
the Apocalypse really closes. ‘The rest 
of the vision, down to xxii. 5, is little 
more than a poetical repetition and ela- 
boration of xxi. 1-8, to which xxii. 6 f. 
forms the appropriate conclusion, just 
as the doublet xix. 9 ὃ, 10 (in its present 
position) does to xix. 1-8. When xix. 
9 ὃ, Io is transferred to the end of xvii. 
(see above), the parallelism becomes 
even closer. Both xvii. (the vision of 
the harlot-Babylon, with her evil influ- 
ence on the world, and her transient 
empire) and xxi. g-xxii. 5 (the vision of 
the Lamb’s pure bride, with her endless 
empire) are introduced alike (cf. xvii. 1, 
xxi. 9) and ended alike, though xxii. 6-8 
has been slightly expanded 1n view of its 
special position as a climax to the entire 
Apocalypse. As xvii. represents John’s 
revision of an earlier source, this sug- 
gests, but does not prove, a similar 
origin for xxi. 9-xxii. 5. He might have 
sketched the latter as an antithesis to the 
former; certainly the ‘* editorial”’ brush- 
work in xxi. Q-xxii. 5 is not nearly so ob- 
vious and abrupt as, ¢.g., in xvili. Upon 
the other hand there are touches and traits 
which have been held to imply the revi- 
sion of a source or sources, especially of 
a Jewish character (so variously Vischer, 
Weyland, Ménégoz, Spitta, Sabatier, 
Briggs, Schmidt, S. Davidson, von Soden, 
de Faye, Kohler, Baljon, J. Weiss, and 
Forbes), delineating the new Jerusalem 
(cf. xxi. I-2). In this event the Chris- 
tian editor’s hand would be visible, 
not necessarily in xxi. 22 (see note), but 
in the apviov-allusions, in xxi. 14 ὃ, 23 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


ΧΧΙ. 


. 5 > N x ee Reus 
XXI. τ. Καὶ εἶδον οὐρανὸν καινὸν καὶ γῆν καινήν 
c BY a ~ > Ἂς πω , A 3 “ 
6 yap " πρῶτος οὐρανὸς καὶ ἡ πρώτη γῆ ἀπῆλθαν, 
nA els > ” 3 
καὶ 7 θάλασσα οὐκ ἔστιν ἔτι. 


(cf. xxii. 5), 25 6 (=xxii. 5 a), and 27 
(=xx. 15, xxi. 8, xxii. 3 a). Another set 
of features (xxi. 12, 16, 24-27 a, Xxil. 2 Cc, 
3 4, 5) is explicable apart from the 
hypothesis of a Jewish source, or indeed 
of any source at all. Literally taken, 
they are incongruous. But since xxi. g- 
Xxli. 5 may be equivalent not so much to 
a Jewish ideal conceived sub specie Chris- 
tiana as to a Christian ideal expressed in 
the imaginative terms of a Jewish tradi- 
tion which originally depicted an earthly 
Jerusalem surrounded by the respectful 
nations of the world, a number of traits 
in the latter sketch would obviously be 
inapplicable in the new setting to which 
they were transferred. These are re- 
tained, however, not only for the sake of 
their archaic associations but in order to 
lend pictorial completeness to the descrip- 
tion of the eternal city. The author, in 
short, is a religious poet, not a theolo- 
gian or a historian. But while these 
archaic details need not involve the use 
of a Jewish source (so rightly Sch6n and 
Wellhausen), much less a reference of 
the whole vision to the millennial Jerusa- 
lem (Zahn), or the ascription of it to 
Cerinthus (V6lter) or a chiliastic Jewish 
Christian editor (Bruston), may not the 
repetftions and parallelisms, especially 
in view of xxii. 6 f., indicate a composite 
Christian origin, as is suggested, e.g., by” 
Erbes (A=xxi. I-4, χα 3-17, 20, 21, 
B=xxi. 5-27, xxii. I, 2, 18, 19) and Sel- 
wyn (xxii. 16-21, the conclusion of A= 
xxi. 2, XXii. 3=5, ΧΧΙ. 5.6 ὮΝ αὶ 7, ‘ox 
6 b-8, or of B=xxi. οὐ 2, xxii. 6, 
8-15)? Some dislocation of the original 
autograph or scribal additions may be 
conjectured with reason in xxii. 6-21 (see 
below), at least. But the reiterations 
are intelligible enough as the work of a 
single writer, whose aim is to impress an 
audience rather than to produce a piece 
of literature. The likelihood is that John 
composed xxi. g f. as an antithesis to the 
description of the evil city which he had 
reproduced from a source in xvii., and 
that he repeated the incident of xxii. 8, 9. 
(as Xix. 9, Io at the end of xvii.), adapt- 
ing it to its position at the close of the 
whole book as well as of the immediately 
preceding oracle. 

CHsapTER XXI.—Vv. 1-8; the prelude 
to the last vision. 

Vv. 1-2, the title: 


τ Je abe ep ut 


“nan, 449). 


1—3. AIIOKAAYYVIZ LQANNOY 


2. καὶ τὴν πόλιν τὴν ἢ 


, > A > Aa > Ν A A ἃ ε , ς , 
βαίνουσαν ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ ἀπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ, ἡτοιμασμένην ὡς νύμφην 


" κεκοσμημένην τῷ ἀνδρὶ αὐτῆς. 3. καὶ ἤκουσα φωνῆς ᾽ μεγάλης "ex 22. 


τοῦ θρόνου λεγούσης, 


3 A ~ 
“1800 ἡ ἢ" σκηνὴ τοῦ θεοῦ μετὰ τῶν ἀνθρώπων, 


A A 
καὶ σκηνώσει μετ᾽ αὐτῶν" 


“full of people” (Isa. xlix. 18). 
XXxXvli. 27, Zech. ii. 10, viii. 8, cf. Isa. lvii. 15. 


I c=xx. 13 a. The absence of the sea 
from John’s ideal universe is due not to 
any Semitic horror of the ocean, nor to 
its association with Rome (xili. 1), nor 
to the ancient idea of its dividing effect 
(‘mare dissociabile,” ‘‘the unplumbed, 
salt, estranging sea,”’), but to its mytho- 
logical connexion with the primitive 
dragon-opponent of God, the last trace 
of whom is now obliterated. Cf. Sib. v. 
159, 160, 447 (ἔσται δ᾽ ὑστατίῳ καιρῷ 
ξηρὸς πότε πόντος), Ass. Mos. x. 6, 4 Esd. 
vi. 24, Test. Levi 4, etc., for this religious 
antipathy to the treacherous, turbulent 
element of water. ‘La mer est une an- 
nulation, une stérilization d’une partie 
de la terre, un reste du chaos primitif, 
souvent un chatiment de Dieu” (Re- 
Plutarch (de Iside, 7 f., 32) 
preserves the Egyptian sacred tradition 
that the sea was no part of nature 
(παρωρισμένην) but an alien element 
(ἀλλοῖον περίττωμα), full of destruction 
and disease. The priests of Isis (32) 
shunned it as impure and unsocial for 
swallowing up the sacred Nile. One 
favourite tradition made the sea disappear 
in the final conflagration of the world 
(R. $. 289), but John ignores this view. 
The world is to end as it began, with 
creation ; only it is a new creation, with 
a perfect paradise, and no thwarting 
evil (Barn. vi. 13). His omission of the 
ocean is simply due to the bad associa- 
tions of the abyss as the abode of Tehom 
or Tiamat (cf. Oesterley’s Evol. of Mes- 
sianic Idea, 79 f., ἃ. A. Smith’s Feru- 
salem, i. 71 f., and Hastings’ D. B. iv. 
194, 105). 

Ver. 2. ék=origin, ἀπὸ -- οτἱ σ᾽ πδίοσ. 
This conception of the new Jerusalem as 
messiah’s bride in the latter days is an 
original touch, added by the prophet to 
the traditional Jewish material (cf. Volz, 
336 f.). In 4 Esd. vi. 26 (Lat. Syr.) 
““the bride shall appear, even the city 
coming forth, and she shall be seen who 
is now hidden from the earth ’”’; but 
this precedes the 400 years of bliss, at 


f xi. 12, Xvi. I. 


479 


, . 
ἁγίαν ᾿Ιερουσαλὴμ, “ καινὴν εἶδον κατα- Ὁ xi. 2, Isa. 


Lit ty 
Heb. xi. 
16, Xii. 


e Ezek. xvi. 
ΤΥ — 


ἘΞ 51 Cf. RX. τῆν h xiii. 6, Ezek. 


the close of which messiah dies. In En, 
xc. 28 f. a new and better house is sub- 
stituted for the old, while in 4 Esd. ix.- 
xi. the mourning mother rather suddenly 
becomes ‘‘a city builded’’ with large 
foundations (i.e., Zion). These partial 
anticipations lend some colour to Dal- 
man’s plea that the conception of a 
pre-existent heavenly Jerusalem was 
extremely limited in Judaism, and that 
John’s vision is to be isolated from the 
other N.T. hints (see reff.). Fora fine 
application of the whole passage, see 
Ecce Homo, ch. xxiv. The vision con- 
veys Christian hope and comfort in 
terms of a current and ancient religious 
tradition upon the new Jerusalem (cf. 
Charles on Apoc. Bar. iv. 3). The 
primitive form of this conception, which 
lasted in various phases down to the 
opening of the second century, was that 
the earthly Jerusalem simply needed to 
be purified in order to become the fit 
and final centre of the messianic realm 
with its perfect communion between God 
and man (cf. Isa. Ix., liv. r1= Tobit xiii. 
16-17, Ezek. xl.-xlviii., En. x. 16-19, xxv. 
1, Ps. Sol: xvii. 25, 33, Ap: Bars xxix 
xxxix.-xL, Ixxii., Ixxiv., 4 Esd. vii. 27¢30, 
xii. 32-34, etc.). But alongside of this, es- 
pecially after the religious revival under 
the Maccabees, ran the feeling that the 
earthly Jerusalem was too stained and 
secular to be a sacred city; its heavenly 
counterpart, pure and pre-existent, must 
descend (so here, after En. xc. 28, 29, Ap. 
Bare xxxit. 3, 4, lest. Dan ἘΠ δρῦν in 
rabbinic theology, the vision of the 
heavenly Jerusalem was taken from Adam 
after his lapse, but shown as a special 
favour to Abraham, Jacob and Moses (cf. 
Ap. Bar. iv.). The Christian prophet 
John not only sees it but sees it realised 
among Christian people—a brave and 
significant word of prophecy, in view of 
his age and surroundings. 

Vv. 3, 4. oknyv. (chosen on account of 
its ‘‘assonance with the Hebrew to ex- 
press the Shekinah,”’ Dr. Taylor on Pirke 


ΧΧΙ, 


4δο ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ΙΩΏΑΝΝΟΥ 


i Gen. xvii. καὶ ' αὐτοὶ " λαοὶ αὐτοῦ ἔσονται, 
8, Jer. x ΕΝ Ἢ ς θ Η 3 ret ae 
χχχὶ. 334 καὶ αὐτὸς 6 θεὸς μετ᾽ αὐτῶν ἔσται. 
2 Cor. vi. z A Η 4 s 
16. From 4. καὶ ᾿ ἐξαλείψει πᾶν δάκρυον ἐκ τῶν ὀφθαλμῶν αὐτῶν, 
Lev. 
χχνΐ. 11+ καὶ ™6 θάνατος οὐκ ἔσται ἔτι - 
12. 

k On plur. ἃ οὔτε πένθος οὔτε κραυγὴ οὔτε ° πόνος οὐκ ἔσται ἔτι" 
see Acts ° a a ” 
iv. 27. Ρ ὅτι τὰ πρῶτα ἀπῆλθον. 

1 vii. 17, xx. ἀνάγει 2 a 
aie ey 5. καὶ “εἶπεν ὁ καθήμενος ἐπὶ τῷ θρόνῳ, ““᾿Ιδοὺ, *kawd ποιῶ 
xxv. 8 ε \ ‘ 
xxxv. ro, πάντα. "καὶ λέγει ““ Γράψον - ὅτι οὗτοι ot λόγοι ᾿ἣ πιστοὶ Kat 

m . - 
ce hore ἀληϑινοί ctor.” 6. καὶ εἶπέ μοι, “΄΄ Γέγοναν. "ἐγὼ τὸ ἄλφα 
xlv. 14; By AEN, ED Rebs Ν x ΄ SNS a - ᾽ S02 ΜΠ a 
Voiz, 48; Kal τὸ ὦ, ἡ ἀρχὴ καὶ TO τέλος. ἐγὼ TH διψῶντι δώσω αὐτῷ ἐκ τῆς 

i a A ~ A ε - , 
Rei" anys "Tod ὕδατος τῆς ζωῆς " δωρεάν. 7. ὃ " νικῶν κληρονομήσει 
(Hiibsch- 
mann, 2 ; ; 

232). n Isa. Ixv. 19, Jer. xxxi. 16, Ass.-Mos, x, I. o = pain, only in Apoc. in N.T. p Isa 


Ixv. 17. q By itself, only here in ρος. r Isa. xliii. 19, 2 Cor. v. 17, vi. 16-18, Barn. vi. 13. 

5 Similar asseverations in Dan. ii. 45, viii. 26, etc. a feature of the apoc. style. : t In sense 
of Ps. xix. 7, cxi. 7, etc. u xvi. 7: On form Deissm. (192). __ v (Emphatic, ἐγώ), cf. i, 8, xxii. 
13, Isa. xli. 4, xliv. 6, xlviii. 12. w Cf. John vii. 37f., Just. Dial. lxix. etc. x xxii. 17, Jobs 
iv. 10-14. y ii. 7; emphatic (αὐτῷ, av Tos). 


1The unusual aoristic (cf. Helbing, 67) termination of yeyovav (sycA, S., Iren., 
edd.) has started the variants yeyovacw (38), yeyove (41, 94: “no doubt a conj. of 
Erasmus based on vg., his MS. 1 reading yeyova,” Gwynn), and yeyova (δ ΡΟ, 
Syr., Arm., And., Areth., etc.; = εἰμι, so Buresch in Rhein. Museum, 1891, 206). 


Aboth iii. 3) is the real tabernacle (Heb. 
viii. 2, ix. 11). The whole meaning and 
value of the new Jerusalem lies in the 
presence of God (En. xlv. 6, Ixii. 14, 
Test. Jud., 25, etc.) with men which it 
guarantees. The O.T. promises are 
realised (see reff.); God is accessible, 
and men are consoled with eternal com- 
fort (cf. Enoch x. 22, kal καθαρισθήσεται 
πᾶσα ἡ γῆ ἀπὸ παντὸς μιάμματος καὶ 
ἀπὸ πάσης ἀκαθαρσίας καὶ ὀργῆς καὶ 
μάστιγος). If we were to read the pas- 
sage in the light of Isa. Ixi. 3-10, the 
tears wiped away would signify that the 
penitents were newly espoused to the 
Lord; but the context here implies tears 
of grief and pain, not of repentance. 
“There shall be no more labour, nor 
sickness, nor sorrow, nor anxiety, nor 
need, nor night, nor darkness, but a great 
light” (Slav. En. Ixv. 9). 

Ver. 5. The first and only time that 
God addresses the seer, or indeed (apart 
from i. 8) speaks at all. The almost un- 
broken silence assigned to God in the 
Apocalypse corresponds to the Egyptian 
idea of the divine Reason needing no 
tongue but noiselessly directing mortal 
things by righteousness (Plut. de Iside, 
75; hence the deity is symbolised by the 
crocodile, which was believed to be the 
only animal without a tongue). 

Ver. 6. ‘Tis done, all is over” (sc. 
οὗτοι οἱ λόγοι Or πάντα). The perfect- 
ing οἵ God’s work is followed, as in Isa. 


liv.-lvi., by a liberal promise of satisfac- 
tion to all spiritual desire, and the 
three ideas of consolation, eternal re- 
freshment, and Divine fellowship are 
thus conjoined asin vii. 14-17. Compare 
the fontal passage in Philo, de migrat 
Abr. ὃ 6 πηγὴ δὲ, ἀφ᾽ ἧς ὀμβρεῖ τὲ 
ἀγαθά, ἣ τοῦ φιλοδώρου Θεοῦ σύνοδός 
ἐστιν. οὗ χάριν ἐπισφραγιζόμενος τὰ 
τῶν εὐεργεσιῶν φησιν, ἔσομαι μετὰ σοῦ. 
The promise implies (like Isa. xliv. 3, not 
lv. 1) that thirst is accompanied by readi- 
ness and eagerness to accept the boon, 
which is free (6) and full (πάντα) and 
filial (ver. 7). The thirst for God is op- 
posed to the unbelief and vice which 
quench it, just as the victorious life is 
contrasted with the craven spirit which 
shrinks from the hardships and demands 
of faith. Similarly the life of strenuous 
obedience now enters on its majority; 
it comes into an estate of filial confidence 
to the great God, bestowed on all who 
acquit themselves nobly in their proba- 
tion. By a rare touch (since iii. 22) in 
the Apocalypse, the individual Christian 
is singled out. Usually the writer is 
interested in the general body of Chk:z!s- 
tians. Here, however, as in ii.-iii., 
religious individualism aptly follows the 
idea of personal promise and encourage- 
ment (cf. xxii. 17), as afterwards of judg- 
ment (xxii. I1-12). 

Ver. 7. These boons (3-7), however, 
are reserved for the loyal; the third (son 


4—8. 


ταῦτα, καὶ ἡ ἔσομαι αὐτῷ θεὸς, “kal αὐτὸς ἔσται por υἱός. 
δὲ " δειλοῖς καὶ ἀπίστοις καὶ ἐβδελυγμένοις καὶ " φονεῦσι καὶ πόρνοις 
καὶ φαρμακοῖς Kal “ εἰδωλολάτραις καὶ πᾶσι τοῖς > ψευδέσι, τὸ 
μέρος αὐτῶν ἐν τῇ λίμνῃ τῇ “καιομένῃ πυρὶ καὶ θείῳ, " ὅ ἐστιν 


ὃ θάνατος ὁ δεύτερος. 


Xxii. 15, 1 Pet. iv. 15, Jas. ν. 6. Rom.i. 29, Mk. vii. 21 = Mt. xv. 19. 


ἃ Gen. xix. 24, Isa. xxx. 33, Ezek. xxxviii. 22. 


of God) was a title applied to Augustus 
and the emperors generally throughout 
the Greek and Roman world. κληρο- 
γνομήσει (here only in Apoc.) in general 
sense=“‘ enter into possession of,”’ *‘ par- 
take of”. (‘‘This place” of bliss ‘is 
prepared for the righteous who endure 
every kind of attack in their lives from 
those who afflict their souls... for 
them this place is prepared as an eternal 
inheritance,” Slav. En. ix.). This is the 
sole allusion, and a purely incidental 
one, to that central conception of the 
messianic bliss as a κληρονομία, which 
bulks so prominently in apocalypses like 
Fourth Esdras andis employedin acosmic 
sense by Paul as lordship over the whole 
creation (see Bacon, Biblical and 
Semitic Studies, Yale Univ. 1902, pp. 
240 f.). The solitary allusion to son- 
ship expresses the close relation to God 
for which this writer elsewhere pre- 
fers to use the metaphor of priesthood. 
Partly owing to the bent of his mind, 
partly owing to the stern circumstances 
of his age, he (like Clem. Rom.) allows 
the majesty and mystery of God to over- 
shadow that simple and close confidence 
which Jesus inculcated towards the 
Father (Titius, 13, 14), as also the direct 
love of God for his people (only in iii. 9, 
10, XX. 9). 

Ver. 8. The reverse side of the pic- 
ture (cf. xx. 12-15 and below on ver. 27): 
a black list of those who have not con- 
quered. δειλοῖς -- “ cowards”’ or apos- 
tates, who deny Christ in the persecution 
and worship Caesar (Introd. § 6) through 
fear of suffering; “δειλία does not of 
course itself allow that it is timorous, but 
would shelter its timidity under the more 
honourable title of evAaBeva’’ (Trench, 
Synonyms, §x.). It embraces further all 
those who draw back under the general 
strain of ridicule and social pressure 
(Heb. vi. 4-8; 2 Ti. iv. 16, etc.), like 
Bunyan’s Pliable, but unlike his Mr. 
Fearing (cf. 1 Macc. iii. 16).—amtorous 
not =incredulous (so e.g., Dittenberger’s 
Sylloge, 8025), 3 cent. B.c.) but, as in 
Luke xii. 46 (cf. Sir. ii. 12 ἢ), =‘ faith- 


ANOKAAY¥IZ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 


481 


8. tots z2Sam. vii 
14, Ps. 


c Eph. v. 5; ver. 27. 
6 xx. 14; constr. Win. § 24. 8). 


less,’’ untrustworthy, those who are not 
πιστός (i. 5, ii. 10, 13, 2 Ti. ii. 13). All 
δειλοί are ἄπιστοι (cf. Introd. ὃ 6), but 
not all ἄπιστοι are δειλοί. There are 
more reasons for disloyalty to Christ 
than cowardice, and some of these are 
hinted at in the following words, which 
suggest that ἄπιστοι includes the further 
idea of immorality (as in Tit. i. 15, 16, 
where it is grouped with βδελυκτοί). 
Lack of faith is denounced also in Apoc. 
Bar. liv. 21, 4 Esd. ix. 7, etc. ἐβδελυγμέ- 
vows for βδελυκτοῖς (as εὐλογημένος for 
εὐλογητός, etc., cf. Field on Gal. ii. 11; 
Simcox, Lang. N.T. 128, 129), ‘de- 
testable ’’ because ‘‘defiled and fouled”’ by 
the impurities of the pagan cults (xvii. 4, 
xVili. 3, etc.; cf. Hos. ix. 10; Slav. En. 
x. 4) including unnatural vice. Murder 
(and fornication, Jas. ii. 11) in the popu- 
lar religions of the ancient world caused 
ritual impurity and disqualified for access 
to God, unless atoned for.—dappaxois 
=‘ poisoners’’ or ‘‘ sorcerers ” (xxii. 15), 
cf. Dan. ii. 27 LXX, and above on ix. 21, 
where (as here and in Gal. v. 21) witch- 
craft or magic is bracketed with idolatry. 
Idolaters, in Apoc. Pet. 18, have a 
special place πλείστου πυρὸς γέμων- 
ψευδέσιν -- ‘liars,’ primarily recreant 
Christians who deny their faith and 
Lord, or worship false gods (Rom. i. 25); 
but also untruthful Christians who cheat 
(Acts v. 3) and lie to one another (Col. 
iii. 9, cf. Apoc. xiv. 5); further perhaps 
to be taken in its general ethical sense 
(Slav. En. xlii. 13; cf. Did. v. 2) = Oriental 
duplicity.—rots δὲ; as in LXX, the sub- 
ject of the principal clause is thrown for- 
ward into the dative (Viteau, ii. 41, 42). 
The special standpoint of the Apoc. 
renders the terms of exclusion rather 
narrower than elsewhere (cf. Volz, 313). 
Thus there is no allusion to sins of omis- 
sion, especially asregards justice and kind- 
ness between man and man (as Slav. En. 
x., xlii. 8-9, Matt. xxv. 41 f.—the former 
apocalypse finely excluding from heaven 
all guilty of “ evil thoughts ” and magic, 
all harsh or callous men, and finally all 
idolaters). The parallels with the rest of 


482 


Cf. xv. 1, 


XVii. I. 


ἈΠΟΚΑΛΥΨΙΣ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 


SAL. 


9. καὶ ἦλθεν ‘eis ἐκ τῶν ἑπτὰ ἀγγέλων τῶν ἐχόντων Tas ἑπτὰ 


iv. 1, xvii. φιάλας, τῶν γεμόντων τῶν ἑπτὰ πληγῶν τῶν ἐσχάτων, καὶ ἐλάλησε 


xix, 7, μετ᾽ ἐμοῦ λέγων ““Δεῦρο, ὅ δείξω σοι τὴν " νύμφην τὴν γυναῖκα] 

xvii. 33 ε΄. τοῦ Gpviou.” το. καὶ ᾿ἀπήνεγκέ με ἐν πνεύματι ἐπ᾽ “dpos μέγα 
Ber pen ὑψηλόν, καὶ ἔδειξε por τὴν πόλιν, τὴν ᾿᾿ ἁγίαν ᾿Ιερουσαλὴμ, 
bah ᾿καταβαίνουσαν ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ "“ ἀπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ, 11. ἔχουσαν τὴν 
3). From" S6§ay τοῦ θεοῦ" ὁ φωστὴρ αὐτῆς “ ὅμοιος "λίθῳ τιμιωτάτῳ, ὡς 
ΖΕΚ. xl. 


2 


Contrast xi. 8. M Xx. 9, xxi. 2. 


1 τὴν γυναικα a gloss from xix. 


the Apocalypse, as well as the general 
style, indicate that xxi. 1-8 comes from 
the pen of the prophet himself; there is 
no evide..ce sufficient to support the 
conjecture that 50-8 is a Christian 
editor’s gloss ina Jewish original (Vis- 
cher, von Soden, S. Davidson, Rauch = 
6 b-8, Spitta). The catalogue of vices, 
not unparalleled in ethnic literature (cf. 
Dieterich, pp. 163 f., 174 f., Heinrici on 
2 Cor. vi. 4 f.), diverges from those of ix. 
20-21 and xxii. 15. The second agrees 
with Sap. xiv. 22-28 in making idolatry 
the fontal vice, and with Did. v. in put- 
ting theft after πορνεία (cf. Heb. xiii. 
4-5, Eph. v. 5, etc.). Paul, again, in- 
variably starts with the blighting touch 
of πορνεία or ἀκαθαρσία (cf. Seeberg’s 
Catechismus d. Ure. g-29, and von 
Dobschutz, pp. 406 f.) as in xxii. 15. No 
special significance attaches to the lists 
of the Apocalypse beyond the obviously 
appropriate selection of idolatry (ix. 20) 
as the outstanding vice of paganism, with 
cowardice (xxi. 8) as the foil to victorious 
confession (xxi. 7, ii. 13, 17, xv. 2); note 
the division of xxii. 15 into the re- 
pulsive or filthy (first three) and the 
wicked (second three), corresponding to 
xxii. Ir. The κύνες of xxii. 15 roughly 
answer to the ‘‘abominable ”’ of xxi. 8. 
xxi. 1-8 are a summary of what fol- 
lows?) χαὶ. ὦ, 02— 9-21, xxi. 3, 4 — ext. 
22-xxil. 5, xxi. 5-8=xxii. 16-21. 

xxi. Q-xxil. 5: the new Jerusalem (re- 
suming the thought of ver. 2, cf. xix. 
7), corresponding to the new universe 
(ver. τὴ. The fall of Jerusalem accen- 
tuated the tendency to rise from the 
expectation of a new or renovated city 
on earth to the hope of a heavenly, tran- 
scendent city (cf. Apoc. Bar. iv. 2-6, etc.), 
though the passionate desire for a resto- 
ration of city and temple in the messianic 
age was still strong (cf. R. ¥. 226 f., 
Volz, 334 f.). John introduces the defi- 
nitely Christian identification of the hea- 


n xv. 8, ver. 23. 


© Sc. ἦν. Pp xvii. 4. 


7? (Bousset, Konnecke, 39-40). 


venly Jerusalem with the bride of the mes- 
siah, and combines the various features 
of a renovated, a heavenly, and a pre- 
existent city—features which occasion- 
ally reflect the mythological background 
of such earlier ideas in Judaism. The 
whole conception, if not the passage itself, 
is satirised by Lucian (Vera Hist. ti.) in 
his account of the golden city with its 
emerald wall, its river, and the absence 
of night, to say nothing of vines δωδεκα- 
φόροι kal κατὰ μῆνα ἕκαστον καρποφο- 
ροῦσιν. Vv. 11-21 describe the exterior, 
vv. 22-27 the interior. 

Ver. 10: a fresh vision, marked by a 
new transport of ecstasy (cf. Ezek. iii. 14, 
xi, I, etc.).—8pos, the vantage-ground of 
elevation from which the seer views the 
site and buildings. If the hill is the site 
of the city, it is a truncated cone like 
Cirta, or a terraced zikkurat. Ezra 
sees the vision of the descent of the 
new Jerusalem in a field of flowers 
(cf. 4, Esd. ix, 26 1 xu 635 Ὁ) one 
John follows either the older tradition 
of Enoch (En, xxiv., xxv.) who visited a 
high mountain which, as his cicerone 
Michael explained, was the throne of 
God ‘‘ where the great and holy One, the 
Lord of glory, the King of eternity, will 
sit when he shall descend to visit the 
earth with goodness,’’ or more probably 
the primitive association of paradise with 
a mountain (cf. Oesterley’s Evol. of Mess. 
Idea, 129 f., Volz, 375). 

Ver. 11, ‘‘ With the dazzling splen- 
dour of God,” cf. on ver. 3, Ezek. xliii. 5, 
Isa. lx, 1,2. Uxor splendet radtis mariti ; 
δόξα, here, as usually in a apocalyptic 
literature, denotes the manifestation and 
realisation of the divine presence. A 
realistic turn is given to the expression 
by the ‘‘shimmering radiance” of ὁ 
φωστήρ K.T.A. (asyndeton); ‘her bril- 
liance is like a very precious stone, a 
jasper, crystal-clear” (f.¢e., transparent 
and gleaming as rock-crystal}, The 


Q—I7. 


- ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


483 


λίθῳ «ἰάσπιδι κρυσταλλίζοντι 12. ἔχουσα τεῖχος μέγα καὶ ὑψηλόν, a iv. 3. 


ΣΟΙ. 2 


ἔχουσα πυλῶνας δώδεκα, καὶ ἐπὶ τοῖς πυλῶσιν "ἀγγέλους δώδεκα, Chron. 


καὶ ὀνόματα ἐπιγεγραμμένα ἅ ἐστι "τῶν δώδεκα φυλῶν υἱῶν 


᾿Ισραήλ. 


Vili. 14 
From Isa, 
Ixii. 6. 


13. ἀπ᾽ ἀνατολῆς, πυλῶνες τρεῖς: καὶ ἀπὸ “βορρᾶ, s vii. 4-8. 


From 


XO apa RS κιςΝ , A A ‘ - ee Ὁ ὃ - a 
TTUAWVES TPELS και ἀπὸ νότου, πυλῶνες Tpelts* και ATO ὀυσμὼν, Ezek. 


πυλῶνες τρεῖς. 


τοῦ ἀρνίου. 


A a , xl viii. 31f. 
14. καὶ τὸ τεῖχος τῆς πόλεως ἔχων “θεμελίους Gy. En. 
Ps τὸ . χχχῖν.- 
δώδεκα, καὶ ἐπ᾽ αὐτῶν δώδεκα ὀνόματα “τῶν δώδεκα ἡ ἀποστόλων yx xv.). 
\ a a For form 
15. καὶ ὁ λαλῶν per ἐμοῦ εἶχε μέτρον κάλαμον“ rel 
a i] , Ν , Ν ‘ a 2 ante ‘ D bing, 33, 
χρυσοῦν, ἵνα μετρήσῃ τὴν πόλιν καὶ τοὺς πυλῶνας αὐτῆς Kal τὸ Wir ey 
ὶ ἡ πόλις “ τετράγωνος κεῖται, καὶ τὸ μῆκος 2: More 


τεῖχος αὐτῆς. τό. καὶ ἣ 


αὐτῆς ὅσον τὸ πλάτος. 


σταδίους δώδεκα χιλιάδων τὸ μῆκος καὶ τὸ πλάτος καὶ τὸ ὕψος 
αὐτῆς ἴσα ἐστί: 17. καὶ ἐμέτρησε τὸ τεῖχος αὐτῆς ἑκατὸν τεσσερά- 
κοντὰ τεσσάρων * πηχῶν, ἢ μέτρον ἀνθρώπου, ὅ ἐστιν ἀγγέλου. 


XXViii. 16. 
absol. Vit. ii. 226, 332-3. 


modern jasper is an opaque tinted quartz, 
only partially translucent at the edges, 
Perhaps, in reproducing Isa. liv. 11-12 
(καὶ θήσω τὰς ἐπάλξεις cov ἴασπιν καὶ 
τὰς πύλας σου λίθους κρυστάλλου), the 
writer regarded both clauses as comple- 
mentary (Cheyne); hence ὡς A. it. x. 
Otherwise ἴασπις might represent an 
opal, a diamond, or a topaz, any one of 
which answers better to the description 
of ‘‘transparent and valuable”. Flinders 
Petrie, however, suggests some variety 
of the dark green jasper. 

Ver. 12. ἔχουσα. The constr. becomes 
still more irregular, the participles agree- 
ing with an imaginary nominative, ἣ 
πόλις, sugg. by ὁ φωστήρ. The in- 
scribed names denote the catholicity of 
the church and its continuity with the 
ancient people of God. A writer who 
could compose, or incorporate, or retain 
(as we choose to put it), passages like 
v. 9 and xiv. 4, is not to be suspected of 
particularism here. Even on the score 
of poetic congruity, the new Jerusalem 
implied such an archaic and traditional 
allusion to the twelve tribes. The angelic 
guardians of the gates are an Isaianic 
trait added to the Ezekiel picture. 

Ver. 13. In one first century inscription 
(cf. Dittenberger’s Orientis Graect In- 
script. Selectae, 199°") ἀπὸ ἀνατολῆς and 
ἀπὸ δύσεως are East and West respec- 
tively. 

Ver. 14. ἔχων, another rough asyndeton. 
---θεμελίους x.T.A., a symbolical and cor- 


v Asin Asc. Isa. iii. 17, ix. 17, Xi. 21. 
figurative Hellen. term = “ perfect " (Plato, Protag. 3444, Arist., Eth. Νίκ. I. x. 11). 
tracted, Hellenistic genit. for πήχεων (Win. § 9, 6, Deissm. 153, Helbing, 44-45). 


καὶ ἐμέτρησε Thy πόλιν τῷ καλάμῳ ἐπὶ ines 


Bopeas 
(Thumb, 


65, 67, 56)» 
u Eph. il. 
20, Heb. 
xi. 10% 
cf. Isa. 
w Like orig. Babylon, Herod. i. 178; 
x Com 
y Nom. 


porate expression for the historical origin 
of the church in the primitive circle of 
the disciples who adhered to Jesus (cf. on 
xxii. 19). It is not their names but their 
historical and apostolic position which 
is in the writer’s mind. The absence of 
Paul’s name is no more significant than 
the failure to emphasise that of Peter. 
For the objective and retrospective tone 
of the allusion, with its bearing on the 
question of the authorship, see Introd. 
8 8. Foundation-stones in an ancient 
building were invested with high, sacred 
significance. Here the twelve apostles 
correspond roughly to the twelve dvAap- 
χοι of the Mosaic period (Matt. xix, 28, 
Clem. Rom. xlii.-xliii.). 

Vv. 15-17. The measures of the city 
are now taken, as in Ezek. xl. 3, 48, xlii. 
16 f., to elucidate the vision (otherwise 
in xi. I, 2). It turns out to be an enor- 
mous quadrilateral cube, like Ezekiel’s 
ideal sanctuary, a cube being symbolical 
of perfection to a Jew, as a circle is to 
ourselves. Whether 1500 miles represent 
the total circumference or the length of 
each side, the hyperbole is obvious, but 
John is following the patriotic rabbinic 
traditions which asserted that Jerusalem 
would extend as far as Damascus in the 
latter days (Zech. ix. 1) if not to the 
high throne of God. In Sib. Or. v. 250 f. 
the heaven-born Jews who inhabit Jeru- 
salem are torun a wall as far as Joppa. 
Further measurements in Baba-Bathra 
ft. 75, 2 (cf. Gfrorer, ii. 245 f.; Bacher, 


484 


z Poetical 18. κα 
form, (cf. 
Jos. Ant. κα 
XV. 9, 6) 
= “ fab- 
tic”’ or 
“ mat- 
erial”’. 

a Ver. II. 

b Cf. on 
iv. 6, ὑ. 
like 
φιάλη, a 
genuine 
form of 
the κοινὴ 
(Thumb, 
18, 75): 

c From Isa. 
liv. 11-12. 

d iv. 3. 

e Here only 
(N.T.). 

Five sey. 
fragm. in Epiph., Haer. xxxi. 9. 


\ 
ι 
κ , 
ι 
ε 


καὶ ἡ “ πλατεῖα τῆς 
διαυγής. 


i Pale sea-green felspar, sometimes aquamarine in colour, 
lix. 17; jacinth or sapphire. 


cf. Job xxviii. 19. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ 


19. “οἱ θεμέλιοι τοῦ τείχους τῆς πόλεως παντὶ λίθῳ τιμίῳ 


ὁ τρίτος “χαλκηδών - 6 τέταρτος 
ἐσαρδόνυξ - ὃ ἕκτος ἢ σάρδιον: ὁ ἕβδομος χρυσόλιθος - ὁ ὄγδοος 
*Bnpuddos: ὃ ἔνατος " τοπάζιον - ὁ δέκατος χρυσόπρασος " ὃ ἑνδέ- 
κατος ᾿ὑάκινθος - ὃ δωδέκατος, ™ ἀμέθυστος. 
21. καὶ οἱ δώδεκα πυλῶνες δώδεκα μαργαρῖται " 
"ava els ἕκαστος τῶν πυλώνων ἦν ἐξ ἑνὸς μαργαρίτου " 


g Red and white onyx (Lxx = ob), 


Cs A} la ~ ’ 7A ay 

ἡ " ἐνδώμησις τοῦ τείχους αὐτῆς "ἴασπις " 

ς , Ἀ ΠῚ be rT 
ἡ πόλις χρυσίον καθαρὸν ὅμοιον " ὑάλῳ καθαρῷ. 


‘ 


κεκοσμημένοι * ὁ θεμέλιος ὃ πρῶτος “ ἴασπις “ ὁ δεύτερος σάπφειρος " 


ft 


σμάραγδος - 20. ὁ πέμπτος 


πόλεως χρυσίον καθαρὸν, ὡς ὕαλος 


h iv. 3. 
k Greenish-yellow gem (periodot ?) 
m Violet or purple. n Late and 


irregular idiom = καθ᾽ εἷς (Blass, ὃ 39, 2, ὃ 45, 3); ο΄. Win., καὶ 26, 9, ava adverbial, like ἕως 


(Deissm. 139). © Xxii. 2. 

Agada d. Tann. i. 194f., 392). Asin the 
case of the tabernacle in Jerusalem of 
the Hexateuch, so here: the symmetry 
and harmony of the divine life are naively 
represented by Oriental fantasy in terms 
of mathematics and architecture. A wall 
of about 72 yards high seems oddly un- 
symmetrical in view of the gigantic pro- 
portions of the city, though it might refer 
to the breadth (Simcox) or to the height 
of the city above the plain. But the 
whole description is built on multiples of 
twelve, a sacred number of completeness. 
The wall is a purely poetical detail, re- 
quired to fill out the picture of the ancient 
city; like the similar touches in 24, 26, 
xxii, 2, it has no allegorical significance 
whatever. Cf. Slav. En. Ixv. 10: ‘‘and 
there shall be to them”? (i.e., to the just 
in eternity) ‘“‘a great wall which cannot 
be broken down’’.—pérpov «.1.A., an- 
other naive reminder (cf. xix. 9, 10, 
xxii. 8, 9) that angels were not above 
men. 

Vv. 18-21: the materials of the city. 
ἐνδώμησις, so an undated but pre-Chris- 
tian inscription, τ. ἐνδώμησιν τοῦ τεμένους 
(Dittenberger’s Sylloge inscript. Graec.* 
58351), where the orthography is pro- 
nounced ‘‘ nova”? (see reff.). 

While the city itself (or its streets, 
ver. 21) is supposed to be constructed of 
transparent gold like the house of Zeus 
πολύχρυσον (Hipfol. 69), the wall ap- 
pearing above the monoliths or founda- 
tion-stones is made entirely of jasper, 
which again is the special ornament 
assigned to the first toundation-stone 
(19, see on ver. 11). The Babylonian 


zikkuvats were picked out with coloured 
bricks; but the exterior of this second 
city is to be what only the interior of a 
Babylonian sanctuary had been—brilliant 
as the sun—flashing with precious stones 
and gold and silver. In Yasht xiii. 3 the 
heavenly Zoroastrian palace of the sky 
also ‘‘shines in its body of ruby.”” The 
general sketch is suggested by Isa. liv. 
II, 12, and even more directly by Tobit 
xiii. 16, 17 (‘‘For Jerusalem shall be 
builded with sapphire and emerald, thy 
walls with precious stones, the towers. 
and battlements with pure gold; and 
the streets of Jerusalem shall be paved 
with beryl and carbuncle and stones of 
Ophir’). The Egyptian mansion of Life 
is also composed of jasper, with four 
walls, facing the south, the north, the 
east, and the west (cf. Records of Past, 
vi. 113). The twelve gems correspond 
upon the whole to those set in gold (cf. 
Ezek. xxviii. 13) upon the high priest’s 
breastplate in P (Exod, xxviii. 17-20, 
xxxix. 10-13), which the writer loosely 
reproduces from memory. What the old 
covenant confined to the high priest is 
now a privilege extended to the whole 
people of God (cf. ver. 22) ; for the astro- 
logical basis and the relation of the two 
O.T. and the present lists, cf. Flinders 
Petrie in Hastings’ D. B. iv. 619-621; 
Myres in E. Bi. 4800 f.; St. Clair in 
Fourn. Theol. Studies, viii. 213 f.; and 
Jeremias, 68, 88 f. No occult or mystical 
significance attaches to these stones. 
The writer is simply trying to convey 
the impression of a radiant and superb 
structure. —oamderpos =lapis lazuli (sap- 


18—23. ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ LQANNOY 485 
22. καὶ " ναὸν οὐκ εἶδον ἐν αὐτῇ - ΜΗ 
XXIV. 2». 
ὁ γὰρ “ Κύριος 6 θεὸς ὁ “ παντοκράτωρ ναὸς αὐτῆς ἐστί, καὶ John, iv. 
21; also 
τὸ ἀρνίον. Jer. if. 
I . 
23. “kal ἡ πόλις οὐ χρείαν ἔχει Tod ἡλίου οὐδὲ τῆς σελήνης tag From 
mos lV. 
φαίνωσιν αὐτῇ " 13:. 
ε Ν᾿ ἌΡ = I xxii. 5, 
ἡ γὰρ "δόξα τοῦ θεοῦ ἐφώτισεν αὐτήν, from Isa. 
Renn ἢ ΠΕΡῚ Η , XXiv. 23, 
καὶ ὁ λύχνος αὐτῆς τὸ ἀρνίον. Ἰχ 
Zech. xiv. 


7. 
s Ver. 11; cf. 4 Esd. vii. 42. From Zech. ii. 5 (LXX), Ps. Sol. iii. 16. 


phirus et aureis punctis collucet. Caeru- 
leae et sapphiri, raroque cum purpura, 
Pliny, H. N. xxxvii. 39), a blue stone 
prized in Egypt and in Assyria, where it 
was often ‘‘used to overlay the highest 
parts of buildings” (Ε. Bz. 2710).— 
xadxyndov=either a variety of dioptase 
or emerald gathered on a mountain in 
Chalcedon (Pliny), or more probably an 


agate (karkedra Pesh. rendering of AY) 
=LXX ἀχάτης Ex. xxviii. 19), 7.2, a 
variegated stone, whose base is chalce- 
dony. The modern chalcedony is merely 
a translucent (grey) quartz, with a 
milky tinge. χρυσόλιθος =a gem of 
some (sparkling?) golden hue (LXX= 


ὩΣ), perhaps some variety of our 
topaz or beryl, which ranges from 
emerald-green to pale blue and yellow. 
The modern chrysolite is merely a hard 
greenish mineral, of no particular value. 
χρυσόλιθος and χρυσόπρασος (a leek- 
coloured gem) are probably varieties of 
the ancient beryl, unless the latter is 
the green chalcedony, and the former the 
modern topaz. μαργαρῖται x.7.A. (on 
their value in the ancient world, see 
Usener’s study in Theol. Abhand. 203- 
213) : the conception is simplified from an 
old Jewish fancy of R. Jochanan preserved 
in Baba-Bathra, f. 75, 1, ‘‘ Deus adducet 
gemmas et margaritas, triginta cubitos 
longas totidemque latas, easque excauabit 
in altitudinem xx cubitorum, et latitudi- 
nem x cubitorum, collocabitque in portis 
Hierosolymorum”’. ἡἣ πλατεῖα, generic 
=‘‘the streets” (like ξύλον, xxii. 2), 
unless it has the sense of ‘‘ forum” or 
‘“‘market-place’’ (as 2 Chron. xxxii. 6, 
Job xxix.7 LXX). But the singular may 
allude to the fact that ‘‘the typical 
Eastern city had... one street which 
led from the void place at the entering 
in of the gate to the court of the king’s 
palace” (Simcox). Philo (quis haer. 
§ xliv., leg. alleg. § xx.) had already 
made gold emblematic of the divine 


VOL. V. 31 


nature diffused through all the world, 
owing to the metal’s fusible qualities. 

Ver. 22-xxii. 5: the life of the city. 
Ver. 22. The daily prayer of Jews at this 
time was “restore thou the sacrificial 
service to the Holy of Holies of thy 
house”’. But while this may have re- 
presented the popular religion of Judaism 
(Schiirer, Hist. ii. 2, 174) which tenaci- 
ously clung to a restored temple as the 
religious centre of all future bliss, there 
were finer spirits who shared the Iranian 
repugnance to temples, possibly under 
a semi-Essene influence, and who seem 
to have partially anticipated the more 
spiritual outlook of the Apocalypse (οὔ. 
Baldensperger, 53 f.) ; the second temple, 
owing to the debasing strifes of the first 
century B.c. and the growing reverence 
for the law, never quite absorbed the 
religious consciousness as the first had 
done. The holy City is to be unlike 
many Chaldean cities where the temple 
was a dominating and distinctive feature, 
often indeed the original nucleus of the 
town. To the seer, earth suggests hea- 
ven not only by anticipation but by 
contrast. 

Ver. 23. Another fulfilment of the O.T. 
ideal (Isa. Ix. 19, 20). It is a Jewish- 
Christian symbol for Paul’s thought— 
God shall be all and in all. So in 
4 Esd. vii. [42] at the last judgment there 
is neither sun nor moon nor any natural 
light, ‘‘but only the splendour of the 
glory of the Most High”. “As the sun 
of righteousness Christ has been able to 
vanquish the sol inuictus of the Roman, 
Cesar-cultus ’’ (Usener, Gdtternamen, 
p- 184). A cruder form of the idea 
occurs in the pseudo-Philonic Biblic. 
Antiquit. where ‘‘non erat necessarium 
lumen (for the night-march), ita exsplen- 
debat genuinum lapidum lumen” (i.e., of 
the jewels on the Amorite idols), jewels 
which were replaced by twelve precious 
stones each engraved with the name of 
one of the twelve tribes. 


486 ATIOKAAYVIS ITQANNOY XXI. 24—27. XXII 


t Ps.ilxxii, 24, kal περιπατήσουσι * τὰ ἔθνη διὰ τοῦ φωτὸς αὐτῆς, 
Is. Ix. 
ha ἼΩΝ καὶ of “ βασιλεῖς τῆς γῆς φέρουσι τὴν δόξαν αὐτῶν εἰς αὐτήν---- 
«Εν, 25: “Kal οἱ πυλῶνες αὐτῆς οὐ μὴ κλεισθῶσιν ἡμέρας " 


29 ital Υ νὺξ γὰρ οὐκ ἔσται ἐκεῖ--- 

; Tepro- x x 

Aes in 426. " καὶ οἴσουσι τὴν δόξαν καὶ τὴν τιμὴν τῶν ἐθνῶν εἰς αὐτήν. 

4 See y Ν 3 ‘ 3 £ > 3 cal Ν Ἂν ε la’ 
XV. 20. 27. "καὶ οὐ μὴ εἰσέλθῃ εἰς αὐτὴν πᾶν κοινὸν καὶ ὁ ποιῶν 


ν Isa. lx. 11, 
Jos. B.J., 
Vil. 10, 4. 

w Zech. xiv. 
7, En. 
Iviii. 3 f., 


7 βδέλυγμα Kat 7 ψεῦδος - 
εἰ μὴ οἱ " γεγραμμένοι ἐν τῷ βιβλίῳ τῆς ζωῆς τοῦ ἀρνίου. 
XXII. τ. καὶ " ἔδειξέν μοι ποταμὸν " ὕδατος ζωῆς, λαμπρὸν ὡς 


A A A a , 
χχχί. 5. “ κρύσταλλον, ἐκπορευόμενον ἐκ τοῦ θρόνου τοῦ θεοῦ “ καὶ τοῦ dpviou 


Slav. En. 

x From. 
Isa. Ix. 5, Εν J 
Tob. xiii. 11, Sib. iii. 772. y Isa. lii. 1, Ezek. xliv. 9. 
iii. 278. a Cf. xiii. 8. a xxi. Io. b vil. 17. 


6, 13; cf. En. Ixii. 14. 


Vv. 24-26 further traits borrowed from 
Isa. Ix. (see reff.). 

Ver. 25. νὺξ «7A. “for no night 
(when even in peace they would be shut, 
Neh. xiii. 19) shall be there’’. 

Ver. 26. From the tradition of En. 
liii. r and Ps. Sol. xvii. 34-35 (where the 
Gentile nations seek Jerusalem φέροντες 
Sapa... καὶ ἰδεῖν τὴν δόξαν κυρίου, ἣν 
ἐδόξασεν αὐτὴν ὁ θεός) : cf. Apoc. Bar. 
Ixviii. 5. The idea of 24 and 26 is of 
course literally inconsistent with those of 
xix. 17 f. and xx. 12 f., since on the new 
earth there were no residents except the 
risen saints. Both ideas were current in 
rabbinic eschatology (Gfrorer, ii. 238 f.), 
but the Apocalypse is entirely free from 
any such complacent estimate of Gentile 
outsiders (cf. En. xc. 30). The dis- 
crepancy here, as in xxii. 5, is imaginary. 
These details are simply poetical and 
imaginative, inserted from the older 
symbolism, in which they were quite 
appropriate, in order by their archaic 
and pictorial fulness to fill out the 
sketch of the future city. They have no 
allegorical significance. 

Ver. 27. R. Jochanan (Baba-Bathra 
f. 76, 2,) said the coming Jerusalem 
would not be like the present one: in 
hanc ingreditur quicunque uult, in illam 
uero non nisi qui ad eam ordinati sunt. 
Citizenship similarly in John’s new city 
is a matter of moral character and of 
divine election, not of nationality. The 
Lord’s city is like the Lord’s table, as the 
Ep. to Diognetus finely puts it (5) κοινή 
ἀλλ᾽ οὐ κοινή, communis but not pro- 
fanus, ‘common and open to all, yet in 
another sense no common thing.” The 
trait is adapted from Slav. En. ix., where 
the garden-paradise of the third heaven 
is only for those loyal to their faith, 


z xxi. 8, xxii. 15; cf. Hom. Iliad 
civ. 6, am. Acy. N.T. d iii. 21, v., 


humble, just, charitable and benevolent, 
blameless and whole hearted, while the 
hell of torture (x. 4-6) is reserved for all 
addicted to sodomy, witchcraft, theft, 
lying, murder, and fornication, besides 
oppression and callousness to human 
suffering. But βδ. and Ψ. may be simply 
“idolatry ” (as in LXX); the keynote of 
the book being struck once more (as in 
En. xcix. 9). In the Egyptian litany of 
the nine gods (Ε. B. D. 35) every petition 
ends with the words, ‘‘I have not spoken 


lies wittingly, nor have I done aught © 


with deceit,” and in Apoc. Bar. xxxix. 6 
the seer accuses the Roman Empire thus: 
‘by it the truth will be hidden, and all 
those who are polluted with iniquity will 
flee to it, as evil beasts flee and creep 
into the forest”’. 

CHAPTER XXII.—Ver. 1. The river 
is suggested partly by Ezekiel’s repre- 
sentation of the healing stream which 
was to issue from the new temple and 
flow through the dreary Ghor of the 
Jordan valley (xlvii. 1-12), partly by the 
reference (in a later apocalypse, Zech. 
xiv. 8) to perennial waters issuing from 
Jerusalem as the dwelling-place of God 
in the new age. John has no use for 
Ezekiel’s idea that the stream would 
assist in the messianic transformation of 
nature. He changes the numerous trees 
on either side of the wady into the 
(generic) single tree of life, reverting as 
before (ii. 7) to the ideal of the Semitic 
paradise. Also, he drops the notion of 
the river sweetening the bitter waters of 
the Dead Sea. Cf. Pirke Eliezer, 51, 
aquae putei ascensurae sunt e limine 
templi atque scaturient prodibuntque. 
The Babylonian origin of the idea is 
outlined by Zimmern in Archiv fir 
Relig. Wiss. 1899, 170 f. Unlike the 





᾿ 
Ἷ 
' 


ee ———————— μιν νεύων 


I—4. 


2. ἐν μέσῳ τῆς πλατείας αὐτῆς - καὶ 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ [QANNOY 


487 


τοῦ ποταμοῦ ἐντεῦθεν Kale From 
Ezek. 


A A n a @ Ph 
ἐκεῖθεν " ξύλον ζωῆς, ποιοῦν καρποὺς ᾿δώϑεκα, κατὰ μῆνα ὅ ἕκαστον χινίϊ. 12, 
ἣν ΝΣ atte and Slav 
ἢ ἀποδιδοὺς 1 τὸν καρπὸν αὐτοῦ - καὶ τὰ φύλλα τοῦ ξύλου εἰς “Gepa- En. viii. 
, A I-4. 
πείαν τῶν ἐθνῶν. f = δωδε- 
rae ees κάκις (cf. 
3: Kal πᾶν κατάθεμα οὐκ ἔσται ETL’ Matt. 
k Sy ie , “- A ‘ A > , > | i 8 ὃ ‘vill. 22). 
καὶ ὁ θρόνος τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ Tod ἀρνίου ἐν αὐτῇ ἔσται ε Win., §20 
‘ c 5 ch > A Wy , i ΝΣ 12b. 
καὶ ot δοῦλοι αὐτοῦ ᾿ λατρεύσουσιν αὐτῷ h For ἵν 
\ ΕΣ a ( ο 
4. καὶ ™ ὄψονται τὸ πρόσωπον αὐτοῦ, Ἔα 
᾽ 
‘ A “- a im- 
καὶ “Td ὄνομα αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ τῶν μετώπων αὐτῶν. ae 
’ 
Lang. 
Ν.Τ. 40. i From Zech. xiv. 21; on futures, see iv. 8.11. Κ΄" Hence”: cf, Josh, vi. 18, vii. 12. 
1 vii. 15. m Job xlii. 5, Ps. xvii. 15, 1 John iii. 2, Heb. xii. 14, cf. Baldensperger, 63. n iii. 


12, XIV. I, Vii. 3-4. 


1 Ti., Tr., WH (marg.), Bs. rightly read αποδιδους (with SQ, min., Areth.). 


earthly Jerusalem with its inferior stream, 
the new city is to be richly equipped 
with conduits and all that makes a city 
prosperous and secure (Isa. xxxiii. 21). 
Ver. 2. πλατείας (‘‘street,”’ or “‘ boule- 
vard’’) collective and generic (cf. Jas. v. 6) 
like ξύλον. Take év... αὐτῆς with 
what precedes, and begin a fresh sentence 
with καὶ τοῦ ποταμοῦ (W. H.), ξύλον 
being governed by ἔδειξεν (from ver. 1). 
The river, which is the all-pervading 
feature, is lined with the trees of life. 
The writer retains the traditional sin- 
gular of Gen. ii. 9, combining it with 
the representation of Ezekiel (yet note 
sing. in xlvii. 12); hethus gains symbolic 
impressiveness at the expense of pictorial 
coherence. Ramsay (C. B. P. ii. 453) 
observes, however, that the waters of the 
Marsyas were “probably drawn off to 
flow through the streets of Apameia ; 
this practice is still a favourite one in 
Asia Minor, e.g., at Denizli”.—r. μῆνα, 
the poetic imagination soars over the 
prosaic objection that months are im- 
possible without a moon (xxi. 22).— 
καρπὸν, κιτιλ. To eat of the tree of 
life was, in the popular religious phrase- 
ology of the age, to possess immortality. 
In En. xxiv., xxv., where the prophet sees 
a wonderful, fragrant tree, Michael ex- 
plains that it must stand untouched till 
the day of Judgment (καὶ οὐδεμία σὰρξ 
ἐξουσίαν ἔχει ἅψασθαι αὐτοῦ). ‘ Then 
the righteous and the holy shall have it 
given them; it shall be as food for the 
elect unto life.”” So in contemporary 
Judaism; ¢.g., 4 Esd. vii. 53 and viii. 52 
(‘‘ For unto you is paradise set open, the 
tree of life is planted, the time to come 
is prepared, a city is builded and rest is 
established,’’) as already in Test. Levi, 
18, where the messianic high-priest is to 


‘‘ open the gates of paradise and remove 
the sword drawn against Adam, and per- 
mit the saints to eat of the tree of life ’’. 
For the association of God’s city and 
God’s garden, cf. Apoc. Bar. iv. : for the 
notion of healing, Apoc. Mos. vi., Jub. x. 
12 f., and the Iranian idea that (Brandt, 
434 f.) the tree of many seeds had cura- 
tive properties. John is therefore using 
the realistic and archaic language of 
Jewish piety to delineate the bliss of 
Christians in a future state where all the 
original glories and privileges of God’s 
life with man are to be restored. The 
Christian heaven is to possess everything 
which Judaism claimed and craved for 
itself. Cf. the Christian addition to 4 
Esd. ii. 12, 34, 35, 38f.; also the famous 
hymn to Osiris (E. B. D., ch. clxxxiii. : 
«1 have come into the city of God— 
the region which existed in primaeval 
time—with my soul, to dwell in this 
land. . . . The God thereof is most holy. 
His land draweth unto itself every other 
land. And doth he not say, the happi- 
ness thereof is a care to me? ”’). 

Ver. 3. κατάθεμα, a corrupt and rare 
form of karavd@eya=anything accursed 
(lit. a curse itself, Did. xvi. 8), z.e., ab- 
stract for concrete, here=“‘ a cursed per- 
son,’’so Ps. Sol. xvii. 2g f—Aatpevoovor, 
unfettered and unspoiled devotion. The 
interruption of the daily service and 
sacrifice in Jerusalem on 17th July, 70 
A.D., had sent a painful thrill to the 
heart of all who cherished the ideal of 
Acts xxvi. 7. No fear of that in the new 
Jerusalem ! 

Ver. 4. The ancient ideal of intimate 
confidence is also to be realised (cf. on 
Matt. v. 8 and Iren. Adv. Her. v. 7). 
With this phrase and that of xxi. 22 
compare Browning’s lines: ‘ Why, 


488 ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY XXII. 
O xxi. 25. 5. καὶ “ νὺξ οὐκ ἔσται ἔτι, 
Ρ xxi. 23; a 

with καὶ οὐχ ἕξουσι 1 ἢ χρείαν φωτὸς λύχνου καὶ φῶς ἡλίου, 

accus. 

iii ἀγὸς ὅτι Κύριος ὁ θεὸς φωτίσει ἐπ᾽ αὐτούς - 
q Dan. vii. 5 A r.? 5 2A a 9.» 

27, cf. kai βασιλεύσουσιν * εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰώνων. 

ap. vi. 
21 (= 


nearness to God). 


τ Not merely for 1000 years (xx. 4). 


1 εξουσι (A, vg., Syr., S., gig., Tic.) Bentley, Lach., Al., Bj., is preferable to 
exovor (SVP, And.), and the context, with its futures and personal pronouns, tells 
against the ov χρεια κιτιλ. of Q, min., S., Pr. (Ti., Diist., Bs.). 


where’s the need of temple when the 
walls | O’ the world are that. . . This 
one Face, far from vanish, rather grows | 
Becomes my universe that feels and 
knows.’”? The idea here is that repro- 
duced in the seventh and supreme degree 
of bliss in 4 Esd. vii. [78] where the 
saints ‘‘shall rejoice with confidence, 
have boldness undismayed, and gladness 
unafraid, for they shall hasten to behold 
the face of him whom they served in 
life’. By Oriental usage, no condemned 
or criminal person was allowed to look 
on the king’s face (Esther vii. 8), In 
the ancient ch. Ixiv. of E. B. D. (papyrus 
of Nu) the “triumphant Nu saith, “1 
have come to see him that dwelleth in 
his divine uraeus, face to face, and eye 
to eye... . Thou art in me, and I am in 
thee,’’? The Apocalypse, however, 
shuns almost any approach to the inner 
union of the individual Christian and 
Christ which distinguished both Paul 
and the fourth gospel; it also eschews 
the identification of God and man which 
was often crudely affected by Egyptian 
eschatology. No allusion occurs to the 
supremacy of the saints over angels (Ap. 
Bar. li. 12, etc.), though John is careful 
elsewhere to keep the latter in their 
place (see on xxi. 17, xxii. 9). He also 
ignores the problem of different degrees 
in bliss,—6Wovtar, In Chag.5 ὃ there 
is a story of a blind rabbi who blessed 
some departing visitors with the words, 
‘“ Ye have visited a face that is seen and 
sees not: may ye be counted worthy to 
visit the Face which sees and is not seen’’. 
The Christian prophet has a better hope 
and promise. Compare, however, Plut- 
arch’s touching faith (Istde, 79) that the 
souls of men after death will ‘‘ migrate 
to the unseen, the good,” when God 
becomes their king and leader and where 
“ they, as it were, hang upon him and gaze 
without ever wearying, and yearn for 
that unspeakable, indescribable Beauty ”’. 
Ver. 5. Philo (de ¥os. 24) had already 
described heaven as ἡμέραν αἰώνιον, 


νυκτὸς Kal πάσης σκιᾶς ἀμέτοχον. Cf. 
En. vi. 6.—Such teaching on heaven, 
though in a less religious form, seems 
to have been current among the Asiatic 
πρεσβύτεροι. Ireneus (v. 36, 1-2) 
quotes them as holding (cf. above on 
ii. 7) that some of the blessed τῆς τοῦ 
παραδείσου τρυφῆς ἀπολαύσουσιν, οἱ 
δὲ τὴν λαμπρότητα τῆς πόλεως καθέξ- 
ουσιν" πανταχοῦ γὰρ ὃ Σωτὴρ ὁρασθή- 
σεται, καθὼς ἄξιοι ἔσονται οἱδρῶντες 
αὐτόν, K.TA. 

The epilogue (6-21) is a series of loose 
ejaculations, which it is not easy to 
assign to the various speakers. It is 
moulded on the lines of the epilogue 
to the astronomical section of Enoch 
(Ixxxi. f.), where Enoch is left for one year 
with his children—‘‘that thou mayest 
testify to them all. . . . Let thy heart 
be strong, for the good will announce 
righteousness to the good, but the sin- 
ners will die with the sinners, and the 
apostates go down with the apostates”’. 
Two characteristic motifs, however, do- 
minate the entire passage: (a) the vital 
importance of this book as a valid and 
authentic revelation, and (b) the near- 
ness of the end. The former is heard in 
the definite claim of inspiration (6 f., 16) 
and prophetic origin (8, 9) which guar- 
antees its contents, in the beatitude of 
7 ὃ (cf. 17), and (cf. 21) in the claim of 
canonical dignity (18, 19). The latter is 
voiced thrice in a personal (7, 12, 20) 
and twice in an impersonal (6, 10) form. 
Both are bound up together (cf. 20 and 
i. 3). It is as a crucial revelation of 
the near future and a testimony to the 
authority and advent of the messiah (cf. 
20) that this apocalypse claims to be 
read, and honoured in the churches. 
This general standpoint is clear enough, 
but the details are rather intricate. It is 
characteristic of the Apocalyse, as of ep. 
Barnabas, that the writer often leaves it 
indefinite whether God or Christ or an 
angel is speaking. Sometimes the divine 
voice is recognised to be that of Christ 


Oe 


5—9.- 


” 


8. "κἀγὼ ᾿Ιωάννης ὁ ᾿ βλέπων καὶ ἀκούων ταῦτα - καὶ ὅτε ἤκουσα § 
Ν aA ~ - fol 
καὶ ἔβλεψα, ἔπεσα προσκυνῆσαι ἔμπροσθεν τῶν ποδῶν τοῦ ἀγγέλου, 


τοῦ “ δεικνύοντός μοι ταῦτα. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ΙΩΏΩΑΝΝΟΥ 


9. καὶ λέγει μοι, ‘dpa μή ὦ 


489 


As ini.9 
(cf. Dan, 
X11. 5). 

2 Cor. xii. 


2. 
Win. § 14, 


σύνδουλός σού εἶμι καὶ τῶν ἀδελφῶν σου τῶν προφητῶν καὶ τῶν 18 


, , =~ , , “- a , ? 
τηρούντων τοὺς λόγους τοῦ βιβλίου τούτου - τῷ θεῷ προσκύνησον. 
6. καὶ εἶπέν μοι, “Οὗτοι οἱ λόγοι “ πιστοὶ καὶ ἀληθινοί: καὶ 


ὃ 
3, 
a 
7. καὶ ἰδοὺ ἔρχομαι ταχύ. 
"μακάριος ὃ τηρῶν τοὺς 
βιβλίου τούτου. 


for they are faithful and true”). 


(cf. i. τὸ f., iv. 1), or may be inferred 
from the context to be that of an angel 
(e.g., xvii. 15, cf. I and xix. 9), perhaps 
as the divine spokesman (xxi. 5, 6, cf. 5 
and 7). But frequently, even when the 
seer is addressed (x. 4, xiv. 13), the voice 
or Bath-Qol is anonymous (¢.g., xi. 12, 
ΤΠ tO, Xiv, 2, XVi. τὶ of. 17). 0 Inthe 
epilogue, as it stands, it is impossible 
_and irrelevant to determine whether 
Jesus (16) begins to speak at ver. 10 (so 
Spitta, Holtzm, Porter, Forbes) and re- 
sumes in 18-20 a. But, while 6-7, and 
8-g are both intended in a sense to round 
off the entire Apocalypse, and not merely 
the immediately preceding vision, 8-9 (a 
replica of xix. 9-10) stands closer to xxi. 
g-xxii. 5 than does 6-7. No λόγοι in 
the last vision justify the reference in 6, 
whereas the specific δεικν. μοι ταῦτα in 
8 echoes the cicerone-function of the 
angel in xxi. 9-10, xxii. I. Vv. 6, 7 very 
probably lay originally between 9 and τὸ 
(for the juxtaposition of εἶπεν and λέγει 
cf. xvii. 7, 15), where they definitely mark 
the beginning of the epilogue already 
anticipated in 8 (cf. i. 4, 9) and in the 
broadened close of g (contrast xix. 10 
above). It is not necessary (though per- 
haps a later scribe may have thought so) 
to account for John’s action in 8-9 by 
supposing that he mistook the angelus 
interpres for Christ. The λόγοι of 6, 
when this order is adopted, acquire their 
natural sense (cf. το), and the three suc- 
cessive angel-utterances (8-9, 6-7, 10-11) 
have a proper sequence, It is needless, 
in view of xvi. 15 (cf. iii. 11) to omit 7a 
as an interpolation (Kénnecke). But 12- 
13 probably have been displaced from 
their original order (13, 12) and position 
after 16 (K6nnecke), where 17 echoes 12 


“kuUptos ὁ θεὸς τῶν " πνευμάτων τῶν προφητῶν ἀπέστειλε * τὸν 
γγελον αὐτοῦ δεῖξαι τοῖς 7 δούλοις αὐτοῦ ἃ δεῖ γενέσθαι ἐν τάχει. 


λόγους τῆς προφητείας τοῦ 


v 4 Esd. xv. 
1-2 
(“Speak 
thou in 
the ears 
of my 
people 
the words 
of pro- 
phecy, 
and cause 
thou 
them to 
be written 
on paper, 


h )e w Cf. for phrase, partial analogies in Num. xxvii. 16 (LX), 
Jub. x. 3, Dan. ii. 28, 2 Macc. iii. 24, Heb. xii. 9, x Cor. xiv. 32. i 
Christian prophets (i. 1), cf. Dan. ix. 10, 4 Esd. viii. 62. 


x Cf. i. 1-2. y 1.e., the 
z Cf. Luke xi. 28, En. ς. 6, civ. 12-13. 


a, and 14, 15 carries on the thought of 11. 
Vv. 18, 19 are plainly editorial, inter- 
rupting the connexion of 17 and 20. In 
11 Resch (Agrapha, § 113) attempts 
to prove that some logion of Jesus is 
quoted. On the “‘inconsistent optimism” 
of xxii. 13 and 15, cf. Abbott, p. 107. 

Ver. 8. There is no trace of any reluc- 
tance on the prophet’s part to return to 
earth, as in Asc. Isa. (Gk.), ii. 33-35. 

Ver. g. The warning against any 
Christian θρησκεία τῶν ἀγγέλων is not, 
as in the parallel passage, an indirect 
exaltation of the prophetic order as 
equivalent to the angelic in religious 
function, but an assertion that even or- 
dinary Christians who accept the Apoca- 
lypse are equal to the hierophant angel. 
Unlike Nebo, the angelic interpreter of 
Marduk’s will in Babylonian religion, he 
is not to be worshipped, for all his im- 
portance. Precautions against angel- 
worship could hardly be more stringent. 
‘“‘ The repetition of the scene is enough 
to show that it does not represent a 
natural ebullition of feeling and its cor- 
retction, but that the narrative has a pur- 
pose ... and that those who observed the 
practice made use of’’ John’s name, or 
at any rate believed they could appeal 
to him as sanctioning their superstition 
(Weizacker, ii. 203-204). 

Ver. 6. As in En. cviii. 6 (only men- 
tion of prophets in Enoch), ‘what God 
announces through the mouth of the pro- 
phets” relates to the future.—zvevup. 
the plurality of spirits is an archaic 
detail (cf. i. 4) adapted also from the 
Enochic formula (xxxvii. 2, etc.), ‘‘God 
of the spirits ”’. 

Ver. 7. Here as elsewhere it is irrele- 
vant toask, whoisthespeaker? Angels 


490 ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ ἸΩΆΝΝΟΥ po 8) 
, ~ = 
τ IO. καὶ λέγει μοι, “Μὴ σφραγίσῃς τοὺς λόγους τῆς προφητείας 
From ᾿ 
Baek. iti τοῦ βιβλίου τούτου - ὁ * καιρὸς yap ἐγγύς ἐστιν. 
ὩΣ, an. ε 9 A > 
xii. 10 11. " ὁ ἀδικῶν ἀδικησάτω ἔτι - 
(LXX), Ai εἰ @e Ν ε , Ξ 
cf. Par. καὶ 6 “ ῥυπαρὸς ῥυπανθήτω ἔτι" 
Lost, ili. Sse , , 3 
τοϑ ἢ, καὶ ὁ δίκαιος δικαιοσύνην ποιησάτω ἔτι" 
εὐ" Filthy” Sk Mer ε Ud dl 
(cf. καὶ 6 ἅγιος ἁγιασθήτω ἔτι. 
Mayor on , Coa, , 4 a 9. A e° ” ε 
Jas. i.21): 14. Μακάριοι οἱ “πλύνοντες τὰς στολὰς αὐτῶν, "ἵνα ἔσται ἢ 
moral ft 


5 a ΝΥ a A > 
ctains ἐξουσία αὐτῶν ‘éml 5 τὸ * ξύλον τῆς ζωῆς Kal τοῖς ἢ πυλῶσιν εἰσέλ- 


v. i ‘ 4 ‘ 
i Qwow εἰς Thy πόλιν. 15. ᾿ἔξω οἱ " κύνες καὶ οἱ ᾿' φαρμακοὶ καὶ 
mere > - - . . - - eee = . 
ceremonial impurity (ῥυπαρᾷ ἐσθῆτι, in votive inscriptions). d iii. 4, vii. 14. e Mixed 


f Accus. here and vi. 8, xiii. 7, xvi. 9; genit. ii. 26, xi. 6, xiv. 18. 

g Cf. ver. 2. Loose extension of dat. instrum. i‘ Out with the (or, out ye)": so Dist., 
Benson, J. Weiss, Wellh., cf. xxi. 8, 27, 1 Cor. vi. 9-10, Introd. § 6. k Matt. vii. 6, Phil. iti. 2: 
='praua concupiscentia " (Gfrorer, i. 404). lix, 21, cf. Deut. xxiii. 18. On their punishment 
in the Hellenic world, cf. Rohde's Psyche, 366 f. 


construction (cf. xiv. 13). 


1The ample style of the Apoc. tells against the conjecture (Zahn, Nestle’s Einf. 
264-265; Bebb, Studia Biblica, ii. 209-210) that the orig. reading is preserved in Ep. 
Lugd. 0 avopos ανομησατω kato δικαιος δικαιωθητω ετι; the rest being glossematic. 
The v. 1. δικαιωθητω (38, 79, vg.) has been mechanically conformed to αγιασθητω. 


2Instead of the well-supported OINOIOYNTECTACETOAACAYTOY (Q, min., 
Syr., S., Arm., Me., Areth., And., Tert., Tic., Cyp., cf. 1 Jo. v. 21; so de Wette, 
Diist., Bs.), OIMNAYNONTECTACCTOAACAYTOQN (NA, 7, 38, vg., Aeth., Pr., 
Haym., etc., edd.) is to be read, the variant being possibly due to the feeling that 


some moral characteristic was needful after 11 (Ws.). 


are the envoys and mouthpieces of God 
here as in the O.T., and therefore en- 
titled to speak in his name or in that of 
Christ. ‘ The Oriental mind hardly dis- 
tinguishes between an ancient personage 
and one who appears in his power and 
spirit’? (A. B. Davidson on Ezek. xxxiv. 
23). In 4 Esd. v. 31-40 the angel is also 
addressed as if he were the Lord—the 
angelic personality evidently fading into 
the divine, as here, and the writer being 
equally unconscious of any incongruity 
in the representation (cf. Zech. iii. 1-4). 
As the “showing” of the ἅ ὃ. y. ἐν τ. is 
(i. τ) an ἀποκ. of Jesus, he (or a word of 
his) naturally breaks in (7 αἹ.---τηρῶν 
«.T-A., an apocalyptic form of emphasis. 
Cf. e.g.. Slav. En. xlvii. 1-3 and xxxvi 
(‘‘tell thou thy sons and all thy house- 
hold before Me, that they may listen to 
what is spoken to them by thee... 
and let them always keep my command- 
ments, and begin to read and understand 
the books written out by thee”). All 
apocalypses were meant to be trans- 
mitted to mankind, but the usual method 
of delivery is complicated (cf. En. Ixxxii. 
I, 2; Slav. En. xxxiii. 9, xlvii. 2, 3, etc.). 

Ver. το. The book of Daniel, the 
great classic of apocalyptic literature, 
is represented (cf. Slav. En. xxxiii. 
ΒΡ Ux: ἢ εν ΟΣ. EDN ἘΠ᾿ ὁ" ke, 
etc.) as having been providentially 
kept secret at the time of its com- 


position, since it referred to a future 
period (viii. 26, xii. 4, 9). This was 
a literary device, to explain why it had 
not been divulged before. As John’s 
apocalypse is for an immediate crisis, it 
is not to be reserved for days to come. 
It is not merely valid (7) but intended 
for the prophet’s contemporaries (unlike 
Isa. xxx. 8, cf. Cheyne’s note), though 
reserved, like most of its class, as eso- 
teric literature for the “‘ wise” (contrast 
4 Esd. xiv. 38-48). Some interval, how- 
ever, is presupposed between the vision 
and its fulfilment, otherwise it would be 
futile to write the visions down, and to 
arrange for their circulation throughout 
the churches. A certain career (7, 9, 
18-19) is anticipated for the Apocalypse. 
But (ver. 11.) persistence in good and evil 
is about all the writer expects—a stereo- 
typed feature of the apocalyptic outlook 
on the obduracy of the wicked and the 
perseverance of the saints. Apocalyptic 
never encouraged propaganda, and no 
radical or widespread change is antici- 
pated during the brief interval before 
the end. Asin Dan. xii. 10, 11, so here, 
the crisis simply accentuates and ac- 
celerates human character along pre- 
vious lines. No anxiety is shown, how- 
ever, as in 4 Esd. iv. 50 f., whether 
the prophet himself is to see the 
end. 

Ver. 15. κύνες, an archaic metaphor, 


1o—16. 


ΑΠΟΚΑΛΎΨΙΣ IQANNOY 


491 


“-“ ~ ~ 4 . 
οἱ πόρνοι καὶ οἱ φονεῖς καὶ οἱ εἰδωλολάτραι Kal πᾶς ™ φιλῶν καὶ m xxi. 27, 


ποιῶν ψεῦδος. 


16. “᾿Εγὼ Ἰησοῦς " ἔπεμψα τὸν ἄγγελόν μου μαρτυρῆσαι ° ὑμῖν 


ταῦτα ἢ ἐπὶ ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις " 


4 
ἐγώ εἶμι ἡ “ ῥίζα καὶ τὸ γένος Δαυείδ, 
er x ε x Nec oo 
6 "ἀστὴρ ὁ λαμπρὸς καὶ ὁ πρωϊνός. 


prophets,” as in ver. 6. p =“‘for”\(x., 11). 


Levi 18, En, xxxviii. 2, Isa. xiv. 12, and Ign. Ep 


coloured by the nomad’s hatred of hounds; 
cf. Arabia Deserta, i. 337, 339 (“only 
the dog has no citizenship in the nomad 
life”. ‘‘It is the only life mishandled 
by the gentle Arab, who with spurns 
and blows cast out these profane crea- 
tures from the tent.”) Here κύνες are 
not merely impure pagans, but the im- 
pudently impure, possibly in the special 
and darker sense of ‘‘sodomites” (cf. 
r Tim. i. 10; Deut. xxiii. 19, 20, collated 
with πόρνη and βδέλυγμα). Cf. on xxi. 8 
and Cooke’s North Sem. Inscriptions, p. 
68. Such loathsome practices were not 
uncommon in the Oriental cults. 

Ver. 16. Jesus in person now speaks 
in the colloquy (16, 13, 12) to ratify 
what has just been said. This apoca- 
lypse is not an individual fantasy (2 
Peter i. 21). For the contemporary need 
of such accrediting, cf. Herm. Sim. ix. 22 
and Asc. Isa. iii. 30, 31 (where in the 
last days ‘‘everyone will say what is 
pleasing in his own eyes. And they will 
make of none eftect the prophecy of the 
prophets which were before me, and 
these my visions also will they make of 
none effect, in order to speak after the 
impulse of their own hearts.”)—ayyedov, 
not John (Weiss, Wellh.) but the angelus 
tnterpres (cf. oni. 2 and 20).—tpiv, the 
plural here and in ver. 6 (cf. i. 1) might 
suggest that John’s apocalypse incorpo- 
rated some visions of other members be- 
longing to the prophets in the Asiatic 
circle or school (cf. the tradition about 
the co-operative origin of the Fourth 
gospel, in the Muratorian canon). But 
while any Jewish Christian sources may 
have been drawn from this’ quarter, the 
final authorship and authority is claimed 
by (or, for) John himself (cf. ver. 8).— 
Δαυείδ. Like most early Christians, 
John attached more weight to the Da- 
vidic descent of Jesus as messiah (Bal- 
densperger, 82 f.), than Jesus himself 
allowed. Here Christ’s authority in re- 
velation is bound up with his legitimate 
claim to be messiah, and thus to inaugu- 


cf. Asc. 
Isa. (Gk.), 
iii. 3, 
Dan. viii. 
25. See 
Win. 8 20. 
Itc. 
n Cf, xxii. 
6 (God). 
o (Dat. = 
Heb. x. 
15) “the 


v. 5: (the scion). r ii. 28, Sir. 1, 6, Test. 


qv. 5 eee 
h. xix, with Luke i. 78 (Dalman, i. viii. 10). 


rate the new and eternal day of God. 
As ἀνατολή (the dawn = maz) was 


already a messianic symbol, and em- 
ployed in LXX (Jer. xxiii. 5, Zech. iii. 8, 
vi. 12) to denote the messianic branch 
or stem, this double usage explains the 
imagery here (so Justin, Afol. i. 32). 
Jesus has not only the historic prepara- 
tion of Israel behind him but the infinite 
future before him. In one sense he was 
the climax of Hebrew expectation; in 
another, he is of world-wide significance. 
In connexion with the heavenly Jerusa- 
lem it was natural that Jesus should be 
hailed as the scion of the David who 
had founded the first Jerusalem. The 
star-metaphor reflects the significance 
of the morning-star which meant the be- 
ginning of a new day for toilérs in the 
Levant; but its eschatological outlook 
was taken ultimately from Babylonian 
astro-theology, where Nebo- Mercury 
(nebi= prophet), the morning-star, an- 
nounced the new era, or from Egyptian 
theology where (cf. E. B. D. p. cxliii.) 
Pepi the dead king “goeth forth into 
heaven among the stars which never 
perish, and his guide the Morning-Star 
leadeth him to Sekhet-Hetep [the fields 
of peace]”. The phraselogy brings out 
the conviction of the early church that 
the present trial was only the cold, dark 
hour before the dawn. Their faith in 
Jesus assured them that an eternal pro- 
spect of bliss awaited them, and that 
this vista of hope was bound up with the 
person of the risen Jesus (cf. ver. 13). 
The watchword was, sunrise and morn- 
ing-star (cf. Expos. Dec. 1902, 424-441). 
Christianity was not some ephemeral 
Oriental cult, which had had its day; 
the cosmic overthrow meant a new era 
for its adherents. The Apocalypse thus 
closes, as it began (i. 5, 6) with a note 
of ringing emphasis upon the eternal 
significance of Christ in the divine plan 
and purpose. 


492 ATIOKAAY¥VIZ IQANNOY XXII. 
s Goes Ls. ee t ahaa ee τὸ ὦ, 

Christ (i. 0 TPWTOS και ὁ ETXATOS, 

17, ii. 8). 


t Cf. Jos. ἡ τἀρχὴ καὶ τὸ τέλος. 
nt. viii. 


τι, 2, 4ῤ. 12. ἰδοὺ ἔρχομαι ταχύ, 


11: 22; why ; See ees 

Philo: de kat 6 “μισθός μου μετ᾽ ἐμοῦ, 

Ss 5 > a 

620 (of Y ἀποδοῦναι ” ἑκάστῳ ὡς τὸ ἔργον ἐστὶν αὐτοῦ. 
L Lol 

Peay τῇ. καὶ τὸ πνεῦμα καὶ ἡ νύμφη λέγουσιν, ““Ἔρχου ᾿᾽" 
wa καὶ *6 ἀκούων εἰπάτω, ““Ἔρχου "᾿. 

MRE καὶ 6 7 διψῶν ἐρχέσθω, 

haga ὃ "θέλων λαβέτω ὕδωρ ζωῆς δωρεάν. 
(Gfrorer, 

i. 285 f.). 


u xi. 18, Isa. {τὺ a , , Ἶ 
xl. Io, TELAS TOU βιβλίου τούτου 


Sap. v.15, 
2 Pet. ii. 


[18. Μαρτυρῶ ἐγὼ παντὶ τῷ ἀκούοντι τοὺς λόγους τῆς προφη- 


ἐάν τις " ἐπιτιθῇ ἐπ᾽ αὐτά, 


18, cf. ἐπιθήσει 6 θεὸς ἐπ᾽ αὐτὸν Tas ἢ πληγὰς τὰς yeypap- 


Clem. 
Rom. 
XXXiv. 

v Rom. ii. 
5-6. 

w Cf. i. 7 
(πᾶς ὀφθ.). 

31.23, etc. ἥ 

x The individual Christian (cf. 1 Cor. xvi. 22). 

a Prov. xxx. 6, Jos. Ap. i. 8. b xv. 6-xvi. 21. 
xix. 11, Did. iv. 13. 


19. καὶ ἐάν ἀέελῃ ἀπὸ 


Ver. 13 gathers up the double thought 
of 16 and of τῶ. As the Christian ἔργα 
(ii. 2, 5, 19, etc.) are done within the 
sphere of faith, their recompense is a re- 
ligious as well as a thoroughly moral 
conception (cf. Hastings’ D. B. iii. 82, 
and Montefiore’s Hibbert Lectures, p. 
538). To the day’s work, the day’s wage. 
For the origin of this feeling on Syrian 
or Semitic soil, where the fellahin’s work 
“was scrutinised before the wages were 
paid’? by one who was ‘‘at once the 
paymaster of his dependents and their 
judge,” cf. Hatch’s Hibb. Lectures, pp. 
224 f. and Dalman, i. § viii. 3. The re- 
ward, like the new Jerusalem, was safely 
stored in heaven. No fear of inadequate 
moral appreciation in the next world, at 
any rate! 

Ver. 17. The promise of 12 a is caught 
up and answered by a deep “come” 
from the prophets in ecstasy (πνεῦμα 
personified, cf. ii. 7, etc.) and the Chris- 
tian congregation.—vipoyn. Hitherto 
(xxi. 2, etc.) this term has been reserved 
for the church triumphant in the world 
to come. Now, with the memory of 
these oracles fresh in his mind, the pro- 
phet applies it to the church on earth, 
as Paul had already done.—kal 6 ἀκούων 
k.T.X., a liturgical note, like Mark xiii. 14 
(cf. Weinel, 84, 85).—Kal ὁ διψῶν «.7.A., 


μένας ἐν τῷ βιβλίῳ τούτῳ 
τῶν λόγων τοῦ βιβλίου 
τῆς προφητείας ταύτης, 


y xxi. 6 (Isa. lv. 1). z John iv. 14,'vii. 37. 
c Jer. xxvi. 2, cf. Deut. iv. 2, xiii. 1, Barn. 


addressed to strangers who sometimes 
attended the Christian worship (cf. 1 
Cor. xiv. 23, 24). For this fine turn of 
expression (the double use of come), cf. 
Did. x. 6, “‘may grace come and may 
this world pass away. Hosanna to the 
God of David! If anyone is holy let 
him come [i.e., to the Lord’s table]; if 
anyone is not, let him repent. Marana 
tha”’ (cf. below, ver. 20). The less likely 
alternative is to take ἔρχου here as ad- 
dressed not to Jesus but to the outside 
world. 

Vv. 18-19. Luther strongly objected 
to the extravagant threat of this edi- 
torial note. The curse is certainly not 
only an anti-climax like the editorial 
postscript in John xxi. 24, 25 (both indica- 
ting that either when published or when 
admitted to the canon, these two scrip- 
tures needed special authentication) but 
‘‘an unfortunate ending to a book whose 
value consists in the spirit that breathes 
in it, the bold faith and confident hope 
which it inspires, rather than in the 
literalness and finality of its disclosures ”’ 
(Porter). But the words are really a 
stereotyped and vehement form of claim- 
ing a canonicity equal to that of the O.T. 
(cf. Jos. Ant. xx. II. 2, τοσούτου yap 
αἰῶνος ἤδη παρῳχηκότος οὔτε προσθεῖ- 
ναί τις οὔτε ἀφελεῖν ἀπ᾽ αὐτῶν οὔτε μετα- 


13—21 


ἀφελεῖ ὁ θεὸς τὸ μέρος αὐτοῦ ὃ ἀπὸ τοῦ ξύλου 
τῆς ζωῆς καὶ ἐκ τῆς πόλεως 
τῆς ἁγίας, τῶν γεγραμμ- 
ένων ἐν τῷ βιβλίῳ τούτῳ.] 
20. Λέγει ὁ μαρτυρῶν ταῦτα "“’ Ναὶ - ἔρχομαι ταχύ ".. 


᾿ ἀμήν - ἔρχου, κύριε Ἰησοῦ. 


21. ἡ χάρις τοῦ Κυρίου Ἰησοῦ μετὰ πάντων. 


third time (7, 12): “ Most assuredly, I am coming speedily”. 


AIIOKAAY¥IZ IQANNOY 


493 


ἃ In Apoc. 
Mos. xvi. 
by over- 
powering 
Adam 
and Eve 
in temp- 
tation, 
the devil 
robs them 
“of the 
garden of 
delight 
and of 
eternal 
life”. 

e For the 

f Cf. on xix. 4. 


10m. Pr.—Of the variants for παντων upev (vg., Aeth.), either πάντων των αγιων 
(Ὁ, min., Me., Syr., S., Arm., And., Areth., Bs.) or preferably παντων (A, am., 
Lach., Ti., Diist., Ws.) seems more original than tev αγιων (δ, gig., Tr., Al., Sim- 
cox, WH, Bj., J. Weiss, Sw.): for a textual discussion see Nestle’s Einfiihrung, 
125f. (E. Tr., 157 f.) and Hastings’ ἢ. B., iv. 733.—After Inoov, Χριστου is added 
by Ὁ, min., vg., gig., Syr., Arm., Aeth., Andr. 


θεῖναι τετόλμηκεν). They are adapted 
from Enoch civ. τὸ f. where the author 
expects his book to be a comfort and joy 
to the righteous, but exposed to perver- 
sion and alteration: ‘‘ Many sinners will 
pervert and alter the words of upright- 
ness ’’ instead of refusing to ‘‘ change or 
minish aught from my words”. Similar 
threats to careless or wilful copyists es- 
pecially in lreneus (Eus. H. E. v. 20), 
and Rufin. pref. to Origen’s περὶ ἀρχῶν 
(cf. Nestle’s Einfithrung, 161 f.). This 
nervous eagerness to safeguard Christian 
teaching was part and parcel of the 
contemporary tendency to regard apos- 
tolic tradition (cf. xviii. 20, xxi. 14, etc.) 
as a body of authoritative doctrine, which 
must not be tampered with. An almost 
equally severe threat occurs in Slav. 
En. xlviii. 7-9, liv. (also iii. 3), so that 
the writer, in this jealousy for the letter 
rather than for the spirit, was following 
a recognised precedent (R. ¥. 125 f.), 
which was'bound up with a conservative 
view of tradition and a juristic concep- 
tion of scripture (Titius, pp. 206 ἢ, 
Deissm, 113 f.). Rabbinic librarii got 
a similar warning in that age (cf. 
Bacher’s Agada d. Tann, i. 254), and 
Christian copyists, if not editors, required 
it in the case of the Apocalypse, although 
apparently they paid little heed to it, 
for as early as the time of Irenzus there 
were serious discrepancies in the copies 
circulated throughout the churches. 
John had himself omitted a contemporary 
piece of prophecy (cf. on x. 4). But 
he explains that he was inspired to do 
so; this verse refuses to let others deal 
similarly with his book. 


VOL; Vv; 


The prayer of ver. 17 is answered in 
ver. 20, which repeats the assurance of 
the messiah’s speedy advent. This pap- 
tupta ᾿Ιησοῦ, in the prophetic conscious- 
ness (xix. το), is specifically eschato- 
logical. The close and sudden aspect 
of the end loomed out before Judaism 
(cf. 4 Esd. iv. 26, 44 50, Apoc. Bar. 
xxiii. 7, Ixxxiii. 1) as before the Chris- 
tian church at this period, bit it was 
held together with calculations which 
anticipated a certain process and pro- 
gress of history. The juxtaposition of 
this ardent hope and an apocalyptic pro- 
gramme, here as in Mark xiii. 5-37 and 
4 Esd. xiv. 11, 12, is one of the anti- 
nomies of the religious consciousness, 
which is illogical only on paper. In San- 
hed. 97 a, a rabbinic cycle of seven years 
culminating in messiah’s advent is laid 
down; whereupon “Ἢ Rab. Yoseph saith, 
There have been many septennial cycles 
of this kind, and he has not come. . 
Rabbi Zera saith, Three things come 
unexpectedly : the messiah, the finding 
of treasure-trove, and a _ scorpion ”’ 
(cf. Drummond’s Fewish Messiah, 220). 
--Κύριε. The Lordship of Jesus is de- 
fined as his right to come and to judge 
(xxii. 12), which is also the point of 
Rom. xiv. 9-12 (cf. Kattenbusch, ii. 609, 
658 f.). Ἔρχου, κύριε is the Greek ren- 
dering of the Aramaic watchword of the 
primitive church (cf. on ver. 17), which 
possibly echoed a phrase in the Jewish 
liturgy (cf. on 1 Cor. xvi. 22, and E. Bi. 
2935, 2936). 

Ver. 21. A benediction at the close 
of the reading (i. 3, xxii. 7) before the 
congregation, rather than an epistolary 


32 


494 


epilogue to the Apocalypse. The epis- 
tolary form in which apocalypses, like 
historical and homiletical writings of 
the age, were occasionally cast, was 
connected with their use in Christian 
worship. Such open letters of pastoral 
counsel were circulated by means of 


AITOKAAY¥IZ IQANNOY 


public reading, and were indeed designed 
for that end. They were not to be re- 
jected as merely local (cf. ii. 7, 23, xxii. 
7-21; Mark xiii. 14 and 37), any more 
than their contents were to be arbitrarily 
treated by individuals (xxii. 18, 19) in 
accordance with their own predilections, 


PRINTED LN GREAT BRITAIN BY 
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